Australia v India in Australia, 2011-12
Greg Baum
|
|||
|
Related Links
Series/Tournaments:
Border-Gavaskar Trophy
|
|||
Test matches (4): Australia 4, India 0
For the second summer in a row, Australia were surprised, this time pleasantly. As in the Ashes, it was not so much the result that astonished, but its scale.
Australia, still smarting from their manhandling by England, had spilled every position in the land and begun again. Some buds of new growth were evident, but so was lots of dead wood, and the team remained brittle. A fortnight before the series started, they lost a home Test to New Zealand for the first time in 26 years. Shane Watson, Mitchell Johnson, Ryan Harris and Pat Cummins, the boy wonder, were all injured - Johnson conveniently so. Running in parallel to the Test series, the reconfigured Twenty20 Big Bash League would be at least a distraction and, to judge from the marketing of it, a more palatable alternative.
On paper, India were powerful and distinguished. The World Cup tucked into their belt - though ornamental for the purpose of this series - added to the impression of heft. Yes, they had been badly beaten in England, and deposed as No. 1, and their away record remained embarrassing - but partly re- conditioned Australia were not England.
India, seeming to take this visit more seriously than the England tour, sent a small advance party, including Sachin Tendulkar, for pre-conditioning (it may not have been a coincidence that no one went home injured this time). The question was not if Tendulkar would make his 100th century, but how soon. On balance, India were just about favourite.
This J-curve of a series reached its turning point late on day two of the First Test in Melbourne. India had advanced to 214 for two in pursuit of Australia's patched-up 333 when Peter Siddle, having just been denied Rahul Dravid's wicket because of a no-ball, sheared through Tendulkar. India never did get to 333. In fact, extraordinarily, they got as far as 214 only twice more in seven attempts, and were bowled out in all eight innings, on four occasions for fewer than 200.
Conversely, Australia were dismissed only once after the First Test, and twice topped 600, thanks to captain Michael Clarke's colossal triple-century at Sydney and doubles for both him and Ricky Ponting at Adelaide. Two innings victories, plus wins by 122 runs and 298, did not lie. Record crowds turned out, and the Big Bash drew well, too. Happy days were here again, and so soon. But how?
Any explanations had to begin with the bowlers. Siddle, Ben Hilfenhaus, the brilliant rookie James Pattinson (until he was injured) and Harris (when rehabilitated) worked as a close-knit team, giving India no respite. Left-armer Mitchell Starc was excellent in cameo, and not the least of Nathan Lyon's achievements was to survive the summer; no mean feat in the post-Warne era.
Mid-series, Virender Sehwag said this was the best Australian attack he had faced. Yet its nucleus - Siddle and Hilfenhaus, who between them took 50 wickets in 292 overs - had ended so miserably against England. The apparent difference was the new bowling coach Craig McDermott, who insisted the seamers have the courage to pitch up to the top order and allow the ball to swing away, still the likeliest means of taking wickets against Test batsmen. In McDermott's first 11 matches in charge, Australia bowled out the opposition for under 200 on nine occasions, and once for 201. Availing pitches helped but, even on a classic Adelaide belter, India could not make 300.
Before Australia's disbelieving eyes, India's celebrated batting line-up faded gently away. Tendulkar, always warmly received, at least started the series authoritatively, but neither Dravid (who was bowled six times in eight innings) nor V. V. S. Laxman was allowed to settle. Reputation alone spared Laxman; it should not have. Generally, India's batsmen fell to pushes, pokes and suspicious prods. The exception was Sehwag, whose method did not look so much like gay abandon as abject dereliction. Only Virat Kohli, Tendulkar and off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin averaged more than 25.
|
|||
Naturally, questions were asked about the effect of the IPL on technique and motivation when the going became as it never is in Twenty20: tough. The 23- year-old stylist Kohli made a century, India's only one of the series, in the last Test. Here was the future India had hitherto disowned. Initially, it had been Australia who were concerned with how to phase out their batting grandees. By the end, it was India's problem, though soon enough it will be Australia's again.
Australia's batting, like their bowling, far outstripped expectations. Clarke was supreme. He became the first Test captain to make a triple-century and a double-century in the same series, proved an alert and imaginative leader on the field, and for good measure deceived Tendulkar with his left-arm spin to clinch the Sydney Test. Captaincy appeared to become him: in his first 12 Tests in the commission, he had made five centuries. Perversely, it took this astronomical performance to conquer at last the snobbery set against him in middle Australia.
Ponting, entering the series on notice from the nation, willed himself back to his best. By the end, he had passed 50 in seven Test innings out of ten, foremost among them a drought-breaking 134 at Sydney and a classic 221 at Adelaide. Unrecognisable at the start, he was unstoppable by the finish.
Yet serious flaws remained. David Warner played his own game, Test20 if you like, to make an arresting 180 in Perth, but otherwise averaged 17. Ed Cowan was an unfashionable and only occasionally effective foil, and the wholly disoriented Shaun Marsh totalled 17 runs, the second-fewest by a No. 3 in a series of three Tests or more. In 16 Tests from the start of the Ashes summer, Australia had been three down for under 100 on 14 occasions.
India had bowling enough to fashion an advantage, but not to press it home. Fit-again Zaheer Khan was dangerous only with the new ball; Ishant Sharma willing, but short in length and luck; Umesh Yadav intermittently surprising; and Ashwin tidy, but lacking in penetration. Oddly, his nine wickets were all either top-three batsmen or tailenders.
Australia, not needing to change much, did not. India, desperately needing to change, didn't either. Their opposition to the Decision Review System was stubborn and self-defeating, their selection reactionary and M. S. Dhoni's captaincy bland. Faced with runaway Australian innings, his tactic was not to slow the batsmen, but the game - blatantly. Greater censure should have ensued. It backfired anyway: at Perth, India's over-rate was so slow that Dhoni, already on a warning, was suspended from the next Test.
Not for the first time abroad, India developed a siege mentality. Ever- provocative Australian crowds got under some skins - Kohli, fined at Sydney for an obscene gesture, damned them as he celebrated his century at Adelaide - and so did some Australian players, reprising an age-old tendency to name- calling. Brad Haddin and Zaheer, then Kohli and Hilfenhaus, had childish tiffs, but generally there was less niggle, at a lower level, than in the infamously fractious Bollyline series of 2007-08.
India did not help by sequestering themselves. Senior players mostly were mute, and Tendulkar, with the world on the case of his 100th century, did not utter one public word. India were also besieged from an unusual quarter: fellow Indians, who felt betrayed. It put Indian cricket on a testy defensive. Acting- captain Sehwag would not countenance change, and said Indians should support their team in their hour of need. Previously, Gautam Gambhir had said it would be different at home. So did the BCCI. Extraordinarily, India were whitewashing two whitewashes.
Match reports for
1st Test: Australia v India at Melbourne, Dec 26-29, 2011
Report |
Scorecard
2nd Test: Australia v India at Sydney, Jan 3-6, 2012
Report |
Scorecard
3rd Test: Australia v India at Perth, Jan 13-15, 2012
Report |
Scorecard
4th Test: Australia v India at Adelaide, Jan 24-28, 2012
Report |
Scorecard
Top
