India-Australia Test: Oz looks to Smith's spunk for resurgence
It’s not as if India’s phenomenal turnaround in Australia in 2020-21, after being shot out for their lowest Test score in the first match of the four-Test series, didn’t receive the encomiums it deserved. But in a world where public memory is short and immediate, Australia’s abysmal display in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy has offered a fresh perspective to that wonderful 2-1 series triumph fashioned against all odds, with several key personnel missing when the series wended to its denouement at the Gabba.
A quick recap. Having gone toe-to-toe for the first two days in the day-night Test in Adelaide, India were fired out for 36 in the second innings to slump to a debilitating defeat. After that game, they lost the services of skipper Virat Kohli (paternity leave) and Mohammed Shami (broken forearm). It was hard to see a way back, a 4-0 hammering appeared a mere formality.
The proverbial Phoenix
From the ashes of that spectacularly inexplicable implosion, India’s rise like the proverbial Phoenix was inspired and inspirational. They kept losing star players, yet they kept rediscovering new heroes. Ajinkya Rahane led with chutzpah and imagination, allowing the players their time in the sun with the giant shadow of Kohli missing. Ravi Shastri and his backroom staff kept the players focused and reinforced positivity and daredevilry. Mohammed Siraj and Shardul Thakur and Washington Sundar and T Natarajan took to Test cricket as if to the manor born. Hanuma Vihari and R Ashwin, both badly injured, defied Australia for three-and-a-half hours to secure a fabulous draw in Sydney. Cheteshwar Pujara battled like a warrior, taking blows above and beyond the call of duty in Brisbane. And Rishabh Pant landed the sucker punch at a venue referred to as the Gabattoir, in deference to Australia’s near-invincible record at their fortress, as India pulled off a famous 2-1 victory despite ending the series with less than half the XI that started the first Test.
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History will rightly recognise that series as India’s finest overseas triumph, which should also make it their greatest series victory ever, shading even the heroic 2-1 result at home against the same opposition in 2001. With emphatic finality, they had shed their tag of dodgy travellers, the boys graduating into men in the space of five weeks despite being shackled by the Covid-19 restrictions that could so easily have shattered their spirit in the wake of 36 all out.
Beaten and bruised
Contrast this with what Australia have served up on this tour of India so far. Armed with a full-strength squad and with the conviction that they would be confronted by raging turners, Australia came to India a week in advance of the first Test and went about polishing their plans, with a scuffed-up pitch, an assortment of spinners recognised and unknown, and a million demons in tow. Inside less than six playing days spread over two Tests, they found themselves 0-2 down, beaten by a mile in Nagpur and sweeping and weeping to their doom in two hours of madness in New Delhi.
With the opportunity of wresting back the Border-Gavaskar Trophy for the first time since 2017 having passed them by, Australia have two final shots at ensuring they can take something back from India – at best, a 2-2 stalemate. For that to have even the slightest chance of transpiring, they must first believe. Believe in themselves, believe in their plans, believe that they can compete with India, believe that they aren’t as bad as the first two Tests would suggest, believe that for all their formidability at home, India aren’t invincible.
Belief, however, will only take them that far. They need to bat better, to start with. Bat with purpose. Bat with composure. Bat the ball, not the bowler. Bat with no preconceived notions. Bat long. Just bat, period, for heaven’s sake.
Eyes on Steve Smith
Who better to stand tall and beacon-like than Steve Smith, their former captain who returns to the helm for the third Test in Indore in difficult circumstances, with regular skipper Pat Cummins having flown back home to be by the side of his terribly unwell mother.
Smith has temporarily inherited a side desperately short of not just confidence but two proven performers in David Warner and Josh Hazlewood, also back in Australia with a hairline elbow fracture and an unresolved Achilles injury, respectively. Conversely, he will be able to requisition the services of left-arm quick Mitchell Starc and high-class all-rounder Cameron Green, who lends balance with his heavy pace and his polished batting.
India have been at the receiving end of several Smith masterpieces, not least on Australia’s last tour in 2017. On a pitch of the most dubious nature in the first Test in Pune where little-known left-arm spinner Stave o’Keefe destroyed India for 105 and 107 with successive bursts of six for 35, Smith provided a masterclass in the art of using his feet on a raging turner. A second-innings 109 was the cornerstone around which Australia fashioned a 333-run victory; he averages 67.14 in 16 Tests against the Indians and has often driven them ragged with his unconventional, unorthodox and annoying but extremely effective batting style.
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Learning from the past
Smith only has 71 runs this series, but as he has shown in the past, he is just one innings away from reprising his heroics of the past. For Australia to mount a semblance of a fightback, the stand-in captain must lead the way. He could take a leaf out of Rahane’s book, for it was the latter’s century in Melbourne that rejuvenated India after the Adelaide rout. Or he could just pluck out a few leaves from his own playbook, full of masterful, in-the-trenches epics that have contributed to a staggering Test average of 60.12 after 94 matches. Not bad at all for someone who started his international career touted as a natural leg-spinning successor to the legendary Shane Warne!
Smith and head coach Andrew McDonald need to do what Rahane and Shastri did two years ago if Australia aspire to salvage something from what has been a tour to forget. India, desperately close to a second final in the World Test Championship, will not play the generous hosts, so all the favours Australia seek will need to be of their own making.
