IND vs AUS: How a day made in Test match heaven unfolded at the MCG | Cricket News

Jasprit Bumrah stood there, head down, hands on his knee at the centre of the MCG pitch when an exhilarating Test-match day ended. His pace partner had just laid down on the ground a couple of balls previously, and took his own sweet time to stir and get up. At fine-leg, another seamer Akash Deep could barely move his legs, stretching his back, and rubbing his knees. The Indian players slowly trudged off towards the tunnel, but Bumrah wouldn’t budge. KL Rahul will cast a look back, run, collect the cap from the umpire, go to Bumrah and pat his back. From near the boundary end, Rohit Sharma would turn, have a look at his premier fast bowler who had busted his guts out to conjure something special from nothing and blow out this long deep breath.It’s a day where one didn’t need commentators and former players trying to hype about Test cricket saying, ‘Test cricket you mad lil’ beauty, the true test of character’ and all that cliched-jazz. We would have felt it in our bones. In the way our eyes would have bulged. In the way, goosebumps would have been experienced. In the way we shook our heads and sighed in admiration or shock, in the way the game can move us like nothing else can. In some ways, a day like this—and hopefully Monday too—can be the greatest wrinkle-free cream out there, taking us back to childhood to when we fell in love with the sport.
India nearly manufactured something out of nowhere, but Yashasvi Jaiswal’s palms betrayed him. Three catches clanged out of his hands, and he would balefully look at them in the aftermath. The hands that rocked the Indian cradle beautifully in Perth’s second innings and in the first innings here at Melbourne, suddenly turned against him on Sunday. He dropped Usman Khawaja early on, but that still was relatively fine. But when Australia were 99 for 6, he grassed Marnus Labuschagne at gully that triggered Akash Deep to end his expletive-filled mutterings with ‘kya yaar!’. At 135 for 6, off Ravindra Jadeja, he reprieved Pat Cummins, a remarkable leader who put his body and spirit behind the line for a most stirring fight.

#JaspritBumrah proving why he’s the game-changer!
Travis Head ✅Mitchell Marsh ✅Alex carey ✅#AUSvINDOnStar 👉 4th Test, Day 5, MON 30 DEC, 4:30 AM pic.twitter.com/FPmkZqQ4LN
— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) December 29, 2024
Siraj’s succour
Where does one start? With Bumrah one must, but that’s the most obvious one. Perhaps with Mohammad Siraj, for he symbolised India’s great fightback when not much was expected from the day. It was supposedly a ‘declaration day’ where Australia were supposed to pile up runs and throw India under the match pressure and the best India could get out of this game seemed a draw. But not just Bumrah, but Siraj too stood up. He has been criticised for his bowling in the last two games. Out of ideas, out of skill apart from the wobble seam, out of energy at times, bereft of a discernible plan. But how he startled the Australians and his critics!
His set-up of the ageing and lucky Usman Khawaja, who was beaten umpteen times, was rather neat. Away, away, for a few deliveries, from over the stumps, before he got the ball fuller, straighter, and not deviating. Khawaja went for the expansive drive, his top hand coming off just like it did in second innings at Gabba, and heard the rattle of the stumps. Later, Siraj would return and finally get some luck with the dismissal of Steve Smith.
Until that moment, things were still going on that ‘declaration day’ way – not quite the way Australians would have wanted to dominate but they had still lost only couple of wickets and imperious Smith and Labuschagne, getting his more than share of his luck but probably earned the doggedness he was showing – he was beaten a lot, but he did his best not to chase, not to let his hands flirt, kept pushing in line in hope. Then first slice of luck with a wide half-volley that Smith went chasing, only to nick it behind to Rishabh Pant.

: , ! 🤪
Siraj catches Labuschagne off guard! Third wicket for DSP Sahab 🫡#AUSvINDOnStar 👉 4th Test, Day 4 | LIVE NOW! | #ToughestRivalry #BorderGavaskarTrophy pic.twitter.com/i3eMomntZl
— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) December 29, 2024
More than 20 overs passed, Labuschagne had worked out a great tactic with his captain Pat Cummins. “I shall take on Bumrah as much possible, we shall run from the other but make sure I am on non-striker’s end the end of those overs.” Simple, but rarely easy to pull it off. But Marnus, another character worth taking a deviation here to focus on. His batting has been much criticised, even more than Siraj’s bowling, Australian fans. ‘Boring’ , ‘fidgety’, ‘no intent’, ‘looking to just survive’, ‘ no good’. Australian cricket prides itself on their No.3. Don Bradman, Ian Chappell, Ricky Ponting …you get the idea. Marnus is antithesis to everyone of those legends. But here he was on a crucial Sunday, wedging himself between India and hory – India would take the BGT trophy if they win here. The same traits that were used as criticism against him was helping Australia. The man who moved to Australia from South Africa when he was 10, the boy who didn’t know English then but could only speak Afrikaans fluently, stood up against India.
In that partnership-phase, Bumrah was taken off, and a mini-battle was won. It’s when Siraj struck, getting a ball from back of length to keep a touch low—not really low in conventional terms but from that length the balls tend to fly over the stumps in Australia. But this is a fourth-day pitch. It’s still not up-and-down in any drastic way that can make India fret sleeplessly, but variable bounce has come in. Siraj’s delivery cannoned into the pads, and a DRS couldn’t save Labuschagne. When the umpire had initially lifted his finger on his appeal, Bumrah turned and whipped up the Indian section of the crowd where Indian flags were waving away. Was he exulting or letting them know not to count him down?
We can’t stay away from Bumrah any longer. The world of batsmen can never get away from him. Early on in the piece, he had knocked down the bails of the ‘Greek Freak’ Sam Konstas with a sharp nipbacker – Konstas’s weakness that he hadn’t quite targeted in the first innings. He re-entered the scene after Smith’s fall. A soft dismissal of Travis Head would get him going, the birthday boy shovelling a back-of-length delivery straight to Nitish Reddy at square-leg. Watching it on the telly was Nitish Reddy’s father who first shouted out ‘Bumrah’ and clapped in joy before his wife whispered it was their son who had taken the catch – and the claps continued. Bumrah pumped his arms—that was his 200th Test wicket—no bowler in hory has done with a better strike rate than him, a stupendous achievement.
Four balls later, 9 balls after Smith’s exit, Bumrah struck again with a peach of a straightener, the delivery that always lands Mitch Marsh in trouble. Unsurprisingly, hard hands emerged and Pant’s soft gloved-hands pouched it.
Two overs later, he landed another blow – his third in 10 balls, when he curled in an inward-angler that seamed in sharply to sneak through the bat-and-pad gap of Alex Carey to clatter the stumps. It was his 23rd wicket at the MCG – the most a visiting bowler at the venue in the last 110 years and Australia were tottering at 91 for 6.
Comeback hour
But what’s Test cricket without a fightback? Bumrah had five more overs, separated drinks break and tea, but Cummins faced just one ball off him. plan, design – and that’s no small matter. Apart from one day at Perth when Kohli and Reddy clattered them, Cummins hasn’t done one thing wrong. Never allowed the game to drift as a captain, never allowed India to breathe easy as a bowler, and rarely left the batting crease without a fight. This was an inspiring back-to-wall fight that slowly but surely deflated India.
the time he was the ninth wicket to fall after soaking up 90 balls for his 41, adding 57 runs with Labuschagne and then with Lyon to take the score to 173, India’s bowlers, the ball, and the pitch had tired out. Akash had been good but luckless with balls teasing the edges and that catch dropped, Bumrah and Siraj kept trying but the ball had gone soft. There was invariable bounce but not drastically up-and-down and Australia’s fight hadn’t evaporated from the G. Nathan Lyon bashed a 54-ball 41 and Scott Boland put his mind and body on the line for a hard-earned 10 from 65 balls as the last-wicket pair added a brilliant unbroken 55-run stand.
So that brutally left Bumrah, Siraj, and Akash feeling every ache in their body at stumps.

But whatever the target Australia set, it presents a great opportunity for the beleaguered Indian captain Rohit Sharma to set the tone in the chase. The great Indian hope would be that Rohit sets it up and Virat Kohli finishes it. But then, mere mortals don’t decide the way this game plays out; it has its own moods and fancies. What will the final day at MCG bring us?

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