India 150 (Hazlewood 4-29) and 487 for December 6 (Jaiswal 161, Kohli 100*, Rahul 77) beat Australia 104 (Bumrah 5-30) and 238 (Head 89, Bumrah 3-42, Siraj 3-51) for 295 runs
Completing a remarkable turnaround, India wrapped up a famous Test victory at the Optus Stadium with a 295-run victory over Australia in a one-sided result that will cause aftershocks in the final Border-Gavaskar Trophy tussle.
India had been all but written out after an unprecedented 3-0 at home against New Zealand. They entered the first match of the series without having played an official match on the tour and were left short without captain Rohit Sharma and injured batsman Shubman Gill.
Under intense pressure, coach Gautam Gambhir made the right moves and brave selection decisions, which included the exclusion of veteran spinners R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja, were justified.
Bumrah, in particular, deserves a lot of credit for galvanizing a new-look team and led from the front with a spellbinding spell at the end of the first day to lift India back into the match after being bowled out for 150 after winning the toss.
There will surely be recriminations for Australia, who were disappointed in their first Test since the March tour of New Zealand. Questions will be raised about the limited preparation of several players.
Australia’s top-order misses will be particularly under the spotlight, especially No. 3 Marnus Labuschagne, who scored 5 runs in the match to continue a long slump.
Having started the opening day so well, Australia’s bowling faltered in India’s second innings and captain Pat Cummins suffered a rare off-match. Cummins had not played a red-ball match since March, preferring to build his series through three 50-over games in the run-up, and finished with modest figures of 3 for 153 from 40.4 overs.
Australia seemed bewildered by the changing pitch conditions, which were spicy on the first day before stabilizing for most of the second and third days. The cracks widened as the match progressed and created up-and-down bounce to make batting difficult on the fourth day.
Resuming at 12 for 3 after a disastrous start in the shadows at the end of the third day, Australia faced an Indian attack looking to finish quickly.
Australia’s hopes of reaching a record 534 runs were hopeless, but their aim was to at least muster some spirit that had seemingly been broken in recent days.
After a golden duck in the first innings, having returned to his favorite number 4 position, Steven Smith faced his nemesis Bumrah, who on the first ball of the day’s play had a strong lbw claim rejected albeit in an anti-climax. It was a no-ball.
Having recently struggled with weight, Smith made a technical adjustment and his trigger movement was not as pronounced as in the first innings when Bumrah pinned him in front of the stumps. Smith still faced a battle and took a painful blow to the ribs from fast debutant Rana which left him face up and in agony.
He continued to bat bravely and combined well with Head, who backed up his aggressive instincts and counter-attacked as they produced Australia’s first partnership in the match for a half-century.
India wiped out the scoring for Smith with Bumrah filling the leg side with fielders as the pressure mounted. Smith’s resistance to 60 balls ended when he clipped an excellent length delivery from a pumped Siraj who straightened up and caught the edge.
After a tough return to bowling, where India’s batsmen treated their modest pace seamers with disdain on the third day, Marsh hoped to finish his Test match at home strongly.
He was in the sea before the lunch break and hit his gloves several times, but managed to hold on. Marsh and Head, who entered the match with limited preparation having been on paternity leave, made batting look relatively easy after the interval at a time of day that had been the best time of day for batting during the match.
Head moved towards a century and, as usual, attacked at any width and continually flayed the offside, while Marsh struck several vigorous aerial blows in a quick half-century partnership.
But Bumrah came back and played a magnificent long delivery that reached Head’s lead in the 89th over and sparked passionate celebrations from Kohli.
Marsh also missed a milestone when in the 47th over he attacked all-rounder Nitish Kumar Reddy, who capped an impressive debut with his first Test wicket.
Mitchell Starc was caught sharply at short leg, giving Washington Sundar his first wicket of the match, and it wasn’t long before India claimed a victory they will hold on to for some time as the pressure begins to intensify on Australia. .
Tristan Lavalette is a journalist based in Perth.
