The third Test match between India and Australia’s first day panned out in a dramatic manner when the visitors restricted the hosts to just 109 runs. Australian spinners exploited the rank turner and left the Indian batters stunned. Virat Kohli was the highest run-getter for India as he made 22 runs. India’s middle order collapsed as Cheteshwar Pujara (1), Ravindra Jadeja (4), Shreyas Iyer (0), and KS Bharat (17) were not able to make it big.
Former Australia captain Ian Chappell came with hard remarks and said, “Cheteshwar Pujara is very jumpy. I think right through the series he has been very jumpy. I keep hearing that Shreyas Iyer is a very good player of spin bowling, but I haven't seen it yet, and I'm not convinced that he is. To me, he is a bit of a panicker”.
“There are some players in the Indian side that haven't convinced me that they're good players of spin bowling. I thought that the Australians spooked India early on. A couple of things happened with the pitch. The Australian spinners bowled very accurately. But what we saw was Australian-type batting from the Indians”, Chappell said on ESPNCricinfo.
Chappell then lauded Usman Khawaja, who scored a brilliant 60 on a tough Indore pitch. “When Australia batted, particularly [Usman] Khawaja, he was very good. [Marnus] Labuschagne had a good partnership with him. There was more of the Rohit Sharma batting when he got the century in Australia's innings. To me, it was Australia who outplayed India and definitely deserved to have the lead,” said the former Aussie skipper.
Currently, India are batting at 79/4 after restricting the Kangaroos to 197 runs. Kudos to Umesh Yadav and the Indian spinners who helped India make a comeback at Indore.