Usman Khawaja was the model Test batsman, soaking up pressure, minimising risk and winning the mental game, batting 11 minutes more than six hours to score 180 off a whopping 422 balls. Cameron Green gave notice of just why Australians are so excited about the giant allrounder, putting his head down and focussing hard on every delivery that came his way to score 114, his first Test century.
Australia had 480 on the board, but if there was reason to believe that India were still in the game, it was provided by Ravichandran Ashwin. In conditions that were very good for batting, the offie was a class act, bowling nearly 48 overs, 15 of which were maidens to pick up 6 for 91. This was his 26th five-wicket bag at home, one more than the great Anil Kumble, and it is an effort he will cherish for a long time.
In these conditions, it was not simply a matter of turning up, rolling the arm over, landing the ball on a spot and hoping the pitch would do the job with its natural variation. These were conditions in which the bowler had to plan and execute every single dismissal, with the various facets of spin bowling coming together.
There are few better slow bowlers in the world for such a challenge than Ashwin. When the Khawaja-Green partnership stretched to 208, and the pair had batted through two complete sessions uninterrupted, Ashwin had to do something different. He packed the leg side field to Green, and came around the stumps, cramping the batsman. The delivery that got the wicket was not the finest, slipping down leg and kissing the glove off the attempted sweep for KS Bharat to catch well, but the thought process showed that Ashwin was not giving up at any stage.
Alex Carey’s airy waft, trying to launch Ashwin over the off side was perhaps the one instance of the batsman giving away his wicket, but even here Ashwin had slowed the ball down nicely, allowing it to grip and take the edge.
Mitchell Starc was a set-up of a different kind. After firing a succession of quick, flat deliveries, into the left-hander, Ashwin floated in the drifter, drawing the bat forward and catching the inside edge with precision. Todd Murphy, who was proving a proper thorn in the flesh with 41, was done in by the ball that went on with the arm and Nathan Lyon got a loopy ball that clipped the outside edge and went to slip via the keeper’s pad.
Ashwin, who is a cricket tragic and has a head for numbers, will be telling his teammates that Australia are far from safe yet. Since 2000 there have been nine instances of visiting teams scoring 400 or more against India. Oddly, only one of those has resulted in a win, with four games being lost and three drawn.
India were already well on their way, Rohit Sharma and Shubman Gill heading to stumps at 36 without loss. While there was a hint of turn for Ashwin towards the very end of the second day, most of his bowling had happened on a placid pitch. With that being the case, the manner in which he controlled the game — going for just 1.92 runs an over — could well be the difference between the two teams.
“I remember my first tour to Australia in 2011-12, I bowled like how a spinner should bowl, put a lot of revs on the ball and spun it harder if things didn’t work,” said Ashwin. “But what I learnt was that to get a bagful of wickets, you have to treat every over as the most important over. I bowled 25-26 good overs and capitalised on it. It was a period of pressure that I could keep on batter for two days.”
Ashwin also conceded that it was good to get the big haul in the bag. “You can go to bed feeling a lot better instead of having just three wickets in your kitty. It does feel good as you end up with a good bag of wickets,” said Ashwin. “I will go to bed tonight a bit early and a bit happier. Sometimes numbers speak easily for the bowler and I felt completely happy in my own cocoon about how the ball has been coming out of my hand.”
Thanks to Ashwin, the entire Indian team will sleep a little easier tonight.
