India v Australia: Third Test, Day Two – Live | Australia cricket team
Key events
But all the chunters in the cricket underworld chat rooms relate to this Six Demon Bag of a ground served in Indore. Darryl from South Africa sent an email overnight with these wise words…
“The ICC must stop the preparation of dust bins and greentops. The only way to minimize the imbalance of pitch preparation and the importance of winning the toss is to abolish the latter by allowing the visiting team to choose between batting or bowling. That would definitely stop this sneaky ground preparation nonsense. I’m shocked at what India has done with the locations for this series but… Live by the dust bowl, die by it too.
After the world was thrilled to the core by New Zealand blasting ‘Bazball’ in their one-point win over England, love for Test cricket is at an all-time high
For those who arrived late… here’s how our very own Geoff Lemon came to be 1
Preamble
Hi cricket fans and welcome to Indore for Day 2 of India v Australia Third Test in Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2023. I am Angus Fontaine and I will be your benevolent Blogfather for the next few hours.
We’ve had some crazy days in this series, but none crazier than yesterday – one wicket with the very first ball of the day, two in the first – but neither given nor seen again. India flayed six borders from the next four and seemed to fly when the worm transformed, then transformed into a cobra. From 27-0, India quickly fell to 34-2, then 45-5 and finally 88-8. In the end, inside 150 minutes of chaos, the home side were decimated for 109. The visitors then coldly carved out a 156-4 unbeaten run – a 47-point lead worth its weight in gold , with six wickets still up their sleeve.
On a dirty, dusty pitch tailor-made for India’s spin kings, it was Nathan Lyon, Matthew Kuhnemann and Todd Murphy who were the day-one destroyers. India’s batters fell just as abjectly as Australia’s in Nagpur and Delhi. The difference was that this time the green caps beat smart and patiently, banishing the sweeping stakes that cost them in the last game, to gain the upper hand.
Can they keep it? In Nagpur, Australia fought for revenge, only to implode again. In Delhi, they faced one of the dumbest and most spineless meltdowns in history. Here, their first order of Usman Khawaja (60), Marnus Labuschagne (31) and Steve Smith (26) showed what it takes to survive and thrive. Can late established hitter Peter Handscomb and returning all-rounder Cameron Green take the lead today?
Close the hatches and fasten the breeches. We’ll be on our way soon…
theguardian Gt
