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R Ashwin sends Australia to a tame defeat
Ashwin's 5/37 -- match haul of 8 -- saw the visitors routed for 91 in the second innings, giving India an innings win on Day 3 of the Nagpur Test
Forget Australia’s spin-focused pre-series plans, even giving up playing a warm-up tie, coming unstuck. The confidence and technique of their batters lay shredded on Saturday after the visitors were routed for 91 against the spin of R Ashwin and Co at the Vidarbha Cricket Association Stadium in Jamtha.
All it took for the home side was a single post-lunch session on Day 3 to wrap up an innings and 132 run victory, for a 1-0 lead in the four-match series. The session lasted 19 minutes more than the scheduled two hours once it became inevitable that Australia would fold up. Rules allow for a session to be extended by 30 minutes if the batting team is nine wickets down. India closed out the issue in nine more deliveries.
An innings defeat inside two-and-half days in the opening Test of a contest where they are trying to avoid a fourth straight series loss to India doesn’t speak well of an Australia side that’s ranked No 1.
Pat Cummins’s team thought they had come to India prepared on the back of a series win in Pakistan and a draw in Sri Lanka last year. By not opting for a practice match, they avoided the Indians teasing them with a flat deck. That training on roughed-up pitches would arm them with more technical knowhow on facing spin. They had faced an Ashwin clone too. But they hadn’t faced the real one.
Australia were made to toil by India’s resilient lower-order batters for a complete session on the third morning – India extended their first innings lead to 223 runs. In response, Australia batters were mesmerised by the spell cast by R Ashwin (5/37) and his fellow spinners. In the first innings, his spin-twin Ravindra Jadeja took a five-for – he finished with a match haul of seven scalps – and scored a solid 70. Jadeja, back after a five-month injury break finished as the Player-of-the-Match.
The visitors had themselves to blame. The ghosts of the rough outside the left-hander's off-stump may have played on their minds, but it never came into play. Not until Axar Patel got their No 9 Todd Murphy out from around the wicket.
How Ashwin approached bowling on the slow and low, wearing pitch was instructive. “I thought this wicket was quite slow. Getting them to drive was a good way for me to lure them into shots and induce the other half of the bat as well,” he told the official broadcaster after the match had been wrapped up with seven sessions left.
Luring the batters is a fine art India’s premier spinner has perfected, employing which he pocketed his 25th five-wicket haul – equalling Anil Kumble’s all-time record. He bamboozled Australia’s top order, four of them being left-handers.
Opener Usman Khawaja, on five, fell to the easiest of set-ups. He was pushed to play on the back foot before being teased into a drive, which he obliged. It was a lot similar to what Glenn McGrath would do to India’s batters in Australia with balls seaming in before inviting them to drive an away swinger.
Just like McGrath knew his exact landing area on the pitch, Ashwin knew precisely where the rough was. He also knew when to bluff the batter by pitching it right there, only for it to not spin. That’s how he trapped Dave Warner (10), who was caught on the crease after driving the bowler for two consecutive boundaries.
For Matt Renshaw was on a pair. Being surrounded by two slips and close-in fielders staring at you with the crowd realising the match wasn’t going into a Sunday also turning up the volume, it wasn’t a good place to be. He lasted seven balls before falling leg before to Ashwin for two. For Alex Carey, when his reverse-sweeps come off, his batting is thrill-a-minute. That didn’t work against Ashwin with his tail up and he became the fifth victim.
Steve Smith cut a sorry figure as he kept asking for review of his fellow batters who were declared leg before. It was in desperation, more in the hope that they would somehow be reversed. In a cauldron of noise and Virat Kohli’s giggles, Smith realised all his partners would have to go.
India captain Rohit Sharma didn’t fire a verbal salvo when asked about India being mentally superior to their opponents. But he did say Australia’s capitulation came as a surprise.
“We were prepared to have a hard day’s bowling…spending session after session. We never thought they would get bowled out in a session. As you saw, the pitch became slower and slower and there was no bounce on it, so it was a bit of surprise for me,” he said.
Australia’s second innings batting surrender was meek; none barring Smith (25*- 51b) lasted even as long as the 47 balls India’s No 10 Mohammed Shami faced. The 91-run dismissal was Australia’s lowest Test score in India, after the 93 in Mumbai in 2004.
“Not too much,” Cummins said when asked if he wanted to explain his team’s batting. “You know, at times when playing in India, the game really speeds up. It’s a good thing if you’re on top. If you’re behind, it can be really challenging.”
