Australia v India Test cricket: live updates, scores, start time

December 15, 2018 John Cricket 0

Australia kept India at bay for the first hour before the visiting bowlers found their lengths and decimated the hosts’ tail.

Pat Cummins and Tim Paine’s partnership passed 50 before the tourists were rewarded for bowling a much fuller length, taking four wickets for 16 runs to wrap up the Aussies’ innings.

After starting the day at 6/277, Australia added 49 runs to be bowled out for 326.

Hazlewood strikes

Josh Hazlewood landed a big blow when he bowled KL Rahul for two.

The full delivery swung away at the last second and beat Rahul’s outside edge before cannoning into off stump.

The Aussies have been rewarded for bowling a full length — in stark contrast to the short stuff India dished up in a frustrating first hour that saw Tim Paine and Pat Cummins blunt the visiting quicks.

Starc’s perfect revenge

Mitchell Starc had the perfect comeback to all the nay-sayers who slammed his performance in the first Test when he knocked over Murali Vijay with an absolute peach.

Shane Warne called some of his efforts in the series-opener “atrocious” while Mark Waugh also criticised him — but they’d be changing their tune after the start to India’s innings.

Starc got a full ball to swing late back into Vijay and the opener had his stumps uprooted for a 12-ball duck.

Mitchell Johnson questioned Starc’s body language in Adelaide but the fired-up fast bowler roared with delightwhen the Kookaburra crashed into the pegs.

The wicket saw India go to lunch at 1/6.

Aussie wreckage after early Indian sins

It took more than an hour but India finally made the breakthrough when Umesh Yadav skittled Pat Cummins for 19.

Yadav hit the top of off stump as he beat Cummins’ defences, ending a 59-run seventh-wicket stand between the speedster and Tim Paine.

Jasprit Bumrah then struck two balls later, trapping Paine LBW for 38 as he was struck on the pad while standing well back in his crease.

India’s tactic was to bowl short at Paine, believing he’s susceptible to miscuing the pull shot, but it only found success when it actually attacked the stumps.

Fox Cricket commentator Mike Hussey said India’s lengths had been off in the morning session, accusing them of bowling far too short when it was clear full deliveries were proving most threatening.

Former England captain Michael Vaughan also tweeted India’s bowlers were getting their areas “all wrong” before they made their breakthroughs.

It took Virat Kohli a while to bring Yadav and Bumrah into the attack after starting with Ishant Sharma and Mohammed Shami and they didn’t take long to do the job for their captain.

Sharma learnt from his earlier mistakes when he came back for a second spell, getting a full ball to angle in to Mitchell Starc before swinging away. Starc got an outside edge from an attempted cover drive that was well pouched by Rishabh Pant behind the stumps.

The next ball was almost identical and Josh Hazelwood went for a golden duck when he too edged to a diving Pant.

Australia lost its last four wickets for just 16 runs as India finally figured out the right areas to hit.

Aussies bring up 300 in Indian ‘heartbreak’

Pat Cummins defied India once again.Source:AP

Australia’s lower order is frustrating India again.

The bowlers proved difficult to dislodge in Adelaide and Pat Cummins was providing good support to wicketkeeper Tim Paine in Perth as the Aussies brought up their 300 about 45 minutes into the day’s play.

Cummins joined Paine with the score at 251 and as their partnership reached 50 Channel 7 commentator Greg Blewett said the tail’s resistance was “heartbreaking” for India.

“It’s heartbreaking for an attack,” Blewett said. “You feel like you have done all the hard work and you can’t knock over the tail, which then means extra overs are bowled and that has an effect as the game goes on.”

Blewett heaped more praise on Cummins — and not just for his cricket.

“I’m happy to admit I’ve got a man crush on Pat Cummins. One, he’s a good-looking rooster, but gee, what a cricketer,” he said.

At drinks in the first session the Aussies had moved to 6/306, adding 29 runs in the day without losing a wicket.

Paine shuffle is back

Just as he did in the first Test when facing Ishant Sharma, Tim Paine was again shuffling across his crease as he faced up against the Indian quick.

To combat Sharma’s inswing Paine was getting outside the line of off stump, making it less likely to get out LBW because he would be struck outside the line of the stumps.

He almost got bowled behind his legs a couple of times in Adelaide because he moved so far across off stump and one of the first balls he faced against Sharma this morning saw the same thing happen.

Paine missed a leg glance and the ball shaved his leg stump, going within a whisker of crashing into the timber.

‘Furious’ Starc responds to stinging criticism

Relax.

Relax.Source:Getty Images

Mitchell Starc only had to sit in the Aussie dressing room on the first day of the second Test — but his ongoing beef with legend Shane Warne continues to make him one of the most talked about Aussies in Perth.

The star quick came under fire from Warne — who labelled some of his work “atrocious” — Mitchell Johnson and Mark Waugh for his erratic radar in Adelaide, despite finishing with 3/40 in the second innings.

Johnson questioned Starc’s body language and Waugh said he didn’t believe the left-armer had bowled well for 12 months.

His wife, Aussie star Alyssa Healy, has since twice gone into bat for Starc, pointing out his sustained impressive numbers with the ball in hand.

The fact that the criticism dominated the build-up into the first day at Optus Stadium reportedly stung Starc, who has never forgotten Warne’s famous criticism that he was “soft”.

It has now been reported that Starc is privateley “furious” about the ongoing comments that have clouded his selection for the rest of the Test series.

“Starc is believed to be furious over the latest bake from Warne, having already been criticised this week by former selector Mark Waugh and pace legend Mitchell Johnson,” Fairfax Media’s Andrew Wu reported.

The same report claims Starc’s fitness was at the centre of a disagreement within the Australian national panel of selectors — Trevor Hohns, Greg Chappell and coach Justin Langer.

Speaking to Fox Cricket’s Mark Howard before play, Starc addressed criticism about his performance in the first Test and said he was actually pretty pleased with how the ball came out, bar a few overs with the second new ball in both innings.

“Bar about three overs I was pretty happy,” Starc said. “Stuck to my plans, did my role for the team.

“I’ve worked on my consistency over the last few years and my economy rate was the best its been for three years so that’s something I’ve tried to work on for a few years and it’s great to see it come to life in the games.

“Bar three overs, I was a little bit off with the second new ball in the first innings, and the second new one in the second innings.

“Bar three overs I was pretty happy with how the ball came out.”

Starc’s limited red-ball cricket before the lead-up to the First Test — where he played in Australia’s limited overs series against South Africa and had just one Sheffield Shield game under his belt — was heavily criticised by some Aussie commentators.

He was also pulled out of NSW’s final Shield clash against Western Australia.

It has now emerged that at least one selector was not happy with Langer’s decision to rest Starc up to save him for the long series against India.

Meanwhile, Aussie great Simon Katich on Friday expressed his support for Warne’s criticism of Starc.

“Warney’s right in a way — his previous 12 first-class games he has been averaging in the 60s with the ball, so there’s a little bit going on there,” Katich told SEN Radio.

“With the wides and byes that he bowled in Adelaide — and they should have been wides — that sort of stuff indicates that maybe not everything is right with his action.

“I’m sure he’s worked hard on it in the last couple of days in between the Tests and he’ll want to get out there and fire – particularly with the new ball, because that’s where Australia needs to open India up.”

Perth pitch looks ominous for India

Australian captain Tim Paine’s coin toss win could not have been more crucial.

His decision to bat first has been completely vindicated by Australia’s first innings and the concerning signs that the Optus Stadium strip was already beginning to break apart on the first day.

It leaves India facing the daunting prospect of batting on a cracking deck in the fourth innings — and bowling in the third innings without a spinner to take advantage of the uneven bounce.

Perth pitch causing havoc

Talk of opening-session chaos proved to be off the mark but it didn’t take long for the Perth Stadium pitch to start playing tricks in the second Test, something Marcus Harris and a more-fortunate Tim Paine could attest to.

Harris’ freak dismissal on 70 after lunch on day one and Australian skipper Paine’s lucky escape late in the final session highlighted the demons lurking in the new stadium’s wicket as the hosts went to stumps at 6-277.

Australia lost three wickets during Friday’s second session, capped by a freakish delivery from India’s part-time offspinner Hanuma Vihari which reared up off a crack and caught Harris’ edge to deny the youngster a maiden Test century.

Paine was beaten all ends up by an unplayable delivery from Jasprit Bumrah with the new ball which jagged off a crack and flew over wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant’s head for four byes.

Bumrah could hardly believe his misfortune and Paine appeared to be equally astonished that his stumps were still standing.

The variable bounce on offer after lunch on day one — some deliveries flew off the pitch while a couple barely carried through to the wicketkeeper — was in contrast to the relatively tame behaviour of the wicket in the opening session. Paine and counterpart Virat Kohli were greeted by an enticing green deck and predictions that it would play similarly to the WACA Ground of old, famous for its menacing bounce and tendency to produce devastating spells.

Australia’s skipper didn’t hesitate to send India into the field on a 38-degree day, a decision that paid dividends when Harris and Aaron Finch (50) put on a 112-run partnership on the green deck.

“Marcus Harris getting bumped out by a 100km/h offspinner might have been the first time for that for a while in Test cricket,” Finch joked.

“At times, you can be a little bit daunted by the colour of the grass, but I thought we played reasonably well in that first session to get through unscathed.” India’s four-man pace attack lifted after lunch, led by Bumrah who trapped Finch lbw and tied down Usman Khawaja (five) in a brilliant spell before Umesh Yadav finished the job.

The pitch is expected to quicken up as the match progresses, with additional moisture added to the pitch on day one to negate the searing heat.

— AAP

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