The Australians may have had wrapped up the Indian visitors right in the first ball of the second day of the Adelaide Test but they began with an early jolt. Ishant Sharma dismantled the hosts’ confidence with one of his magnificent deliveries to remove Aaron Finch on a duck.
The incident happened in just the 3rd ball of the Australian innings when Ishant’s pitched up delivery saw Finch taking a stride forward to drive but completely misjudged it. The ball took an inside edge of Finch’s willow and dislodged his off and leg-stumps.
Here’s the video:
Finch was stunned, Ishant was delighted but it was Indian skipper Virat Kohli who was pumped-up the most with this early success.
Later in the day, Ashwin removed debutant Marcus Harris on 26 to reduce Australia to 45/2 at the stroke of lunch.
Earlier in the morning, the visitors failed to add any runs to their overnight 250-run core as Pacer Josh Hazlewood got the last man Mohammed Shami (6) caught behind on the very first ball.
Earlier on Thursday, India were reduced to 19/3 before centurion Cheteshwar Pujara's gritty 16th Test ton (123) anchored the innings to 250/9 at stumps. Pujara, however, fell to a brilliant run out on the last ball of the opening day.