And here’s the day five match report. For all 27 balls of it.
Jasprit Bumrah is man of the match. And rightly so, his nine wickets for the match, including 6/33 in Australia’s first innings, was the major difference between these sides. On that note, I have to run downstairs for the press conferenes. On behalf of Geoff, JP and myself, thanks for your company this week and 2018! We’ll talk to you again in Sydney next week. Bye for now from the MCG! Happy New Year!
Virat Kohli speaks.
“We are not going to stop here. This has only given us more confidence to go to Sydney and play more positive cricket. We have retained the trophy bit the job is not done yet. We want to win the last Test as well and that’s the mindset we are playing with since we started in South Africa. We are all ready for the Sydney Test now.”
“Credit has to go to our bowlers they have been outstanding, especially Jasprit. They have broken a big record with three fast bowlers taking so many wickets in a calendar year which is something we can be really proud of. The way Jasprit bowled in Perth it was criminal that he didn’t get the wickets but he won us the Test Match here.”
Tim Paine speaks.
“It is a bit disappointing no doubt I thought we made some strides forward in Perth but with an inexperienced betting performance you are going to have performances as we did in the first innings.”
“You have got to put it into perspective we are playing against the best attack in the world at the moment and we have a really inexperienced top six.”
We are always trying to get better and we have a huge Test coming up ahead of us in Sydney. There are always little discussions around batting orders and teams and it’ll be no different coming into the Sydney Test.”
“You can be skilful as you like but Pat Cummins rolls his sleeves up every day and we’re looking forward to having a few others going with him.”
“I think the silver lining is that we have in the next few months we have some world class players available coming back into our set up and we’ve been able to get some valuable time into some young batter. But we are under no illusions that we are going to have to work really hard to level this series then Sri Lanka is going to be a really big challenge for us.”
The Indian fans are singing the national anthem. They have been quite superb. Virat Kohli is over there now giving his batting pads away to them as well. I want to see him get his full kit off like Shane Crawford did after his 200th game. Righto, to the presentations. Stand by.
Rishabh Pant speaks. “It is a pretty special moment. We always thought about it and we’ve got it right now. People are coming from India and we have fantastic support and we love it. We always give 100% for these people. We love playing in Australia. There is always a special performance in every match and Bumrah gave it in this match.”
Pat Cummins speaks. “We probably didn’t absorb the pressure we well as India did,” he says. “We were probably only 100 runs away from putting up a really good show in the first innings and a session in the second from drawing the match. But they outplayed us.” On a personal level? “I’m pretty happy with my game It has been a long six or seven years and last year a first home series was amazing and to come out here and really contribute, it is more than I could ever hope for.”
27 balls is all it took to finish the job this morning for the visitors, Cummins then Lyon edging behind in the consecutive overs. A truly magnificent bowling performance again from this Indian attack, surely the best they have ever assmbled. Their loyal fans are going wild in the bottom of the northern stand, as they should.
🇮🇳 INDIA WINS 🇮🇳#AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/wD7tbsnJj1
— #7Cricket (@7Cricket) December 30, 2018
INDIA WIN BY 137 RUNS! WICKET! Lyon c Pant b Ishant 7 (Australia all-out 261)
Lyon tries to hook Ishant but only edges it through to Pant. It’s all over! India win the Boxing Day Test for the first time and retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. A mighty performance from Virat Kohli and his men.
89th over: Australia 261-9 (Lyon 7, Hazlewood 0) Somehow, Hazlewood keeps four straight and swinging Bumrah balls off his stumps to survive the over.
OUT.
— #7Cricket (@7Cricket) December 30, 2018
Cummins edges, Pujara catches.
India one wicket away #AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/SnVnokaQq9
WICKET! Cummins c Pujara b Bumrah 63 (Australia 261-9)
Lovely fuller delivery that Cummins had to play, the edge found, the ball landing in the safe hands of Pujara at slip. Excellent cricket from the visitors - they have earned this.
88th over: Australia 261-8 (Cummins 63, Lyon 7) Ishant beats Lyon first up, driving at a ball away from his body. Lyon gets better as the over goes on, leaving and defending confidently to complete the maiden. The Bharat and Swami Armies look to have joined up in the northern stand and they are making plenty of noise. Great stuff.
I reckon the crowd here today comprises around 80% India fans and 20% Australian. There is no scientific basis for this estimate. #AUSvIND
— Melinda Farrell (@melindafarrell) December 30, 2018
Bay 13 is now the Bay of Bengal.#AUSvsIND
— Greg Baum (@GregBaum) December 30, 2018
87th over: Australia 261-8 (Cummins 63, Lyon 7) Bumrah to Cummins from the members end. “It’s basically a new ball,” notes Glenn McGrath on Macquarie radio, so he’s the obvious man to start rather than Jadeja, with eight wickets to his name in this Test. He’s getting the ball through nicely to the gloves of Pant, Cummins fending at one that just misses his outside edge. There are two back on the hook, which McGrath says “is ridiculous” as Cummins ducks under a bouncer - he’s not hooking any time soon.
86th over: Australia 261-8 (Cummins 63, Lyon 7) Cummins away first ball, tucking Ishant fine, Lyon then doing likewise. Between times, the ground staff came out to bang away at the run up and lay a bit of sawdust. There’s a half-hearted should from Pant got a catch down the legside, but there’s nothing in that, says Umpire Gunner Gould. Cummins keeps the strike with a push to the sweeper (a sweeper?! Now?) at point. Speaking of Gunner, he knows a bit about being at the MCG on unexpected fifth days.
And per @derekpringle’s magnificent book, earlier in the Test, Gunner had a meat pie dumped on his head on the boundary at Bay 13. Doubly unusual for a bloke who was a wicketkeeper. pic.twitter.com/GQxPCa44DT
— Adam Collins (@collinsadam) December 29, 2018
The players are on the field!
We have 71 overs ahead of us (in theory) because we lose eight from last night. This has been confirmed by CA after a bit of confusion earlier. The tea break will be at 2:55pm, in that unlikely event, but with Pat Cummins there, who would doubt it? Ishant Sharma has the ball in his hand from the Great Southern Stand End and he’ll be starting off at Cummins (61) with Lyon (4) down the other end. Australia require 141 runs for one of the most famous victories in the history of Test cricket. Yeah, I’m talking it up. PLAY!
I saw Nathan Lyon’s brother Brendan in the corridor. He’s been getting some very good press (not least from me) for the work he did on Nathan’s batting during the winter. “I wish the rain would go away,” he said to me. “It’s delaying the run chase!”
To get us in the mood on the big screen they are showing us Brett Lee’s Test debut 5fa on debut from this fixture in December 1999. I was sitting behind his spell in the Southern Stand that day, behind the arm on level four. Good childhood memories.
Why, hello there! Remember yesterday when I said my goodbyes for 2018? Certain that Australia would roll over to have their bellies tickled in time for dinner last night? Well, I was right in a way - the top and middle order did as scripted. Then Pat Cummins showed up and here we are, some 22 hours later with no result acheived as yet.
I asked Nathan Lyon last night whether Cummins could captain Australia once Tim Paine gives it away. He didn’t engage with the question, but it got me thinking all the same. Who better? Sure, in the 817 Tests Australia has played, only one has been led by a fast bowler (Lindy filled in for one in 1957).
But the world has changed, no? We tend to ignore most of the rules of yesteryear in the modern era, or at least see them adapted. Do you seriously believe that a bloke who can keep his nerve like this after running literally a marathon (according to GPS data) in the field over days one and two would be any less capable calling the shots as well? He’s 25 and Tim Paine is 34, so time is on his side.
As I argued in a piece last night, the other contenders - let’s for the purpose of the hypothetical blanket Smith, Marsh the younger and Finch - all have hairs on them. In the case of the latter two, they are both going to be dropped next week as it is. Cummins, meanwhile, could end up a Kapil or an Imran if his batting keeps doing as it does. What did those two do? They only led World Cup winning teams.
What do you think? Drop me a line. Let’s talk about Pat the leader as he makes his way to a maiden Test ton. With the covers now off and stumps in the ground, we will be away in 15 minutes from now. You know the deal: email or tweet me your takes.
Deepika Sharma emails in: “Hey Geoff, I cancelled my Saturday night plans to see India win and have been checking the weather every minute. Your blog keeps it interesting though and it keeps me awake too!”
Never cancel Saturday night plans, my friends. Not for the fickleness of cricket and Melbourne weather. Though the history of an Indian win... last time they won at the MCG, none of the players from either of the current sides was born.
But thanks Deepika, it’s been fun. Time for Adam Collins to take over for lunch, then some actual cricket. The covers have just started to be pulled back, to cheers around the ground. And it would be funny if after all this, the session lasts two balls.
Thanks for your company. Let’s do it again in Sydney.
@GeoffLemonSport
— TheStellarossa (@TheStellaRossa) December 30, 2018
You have to - on occasion - look beyond winning and pay respect you the history of Test cricket. That is, you enforce the follow on, and see what happens.
Psssssh Stella Rossa, I’m making disapproving mouth sounds. “See what happens” is what you do when trying to connect your stereo system after moving house. Or when Muttiah Muralitharan bats. It’s not a viable approach to match tactics. (Ok, granted, it’s often the only approach to match tactics.)
Anyway, I do my paying of respects to the history of Test cricket by reading scorecards from 1888.
Updated
@GeoffLemonSport here’s the Wikipedia argument on the follow on: pic.twitter.com/0A33sCTDDj
— gavin robertson (@gavin_robertson) December 30, 2018
Mates, I will fight Mike Brearley any day of the week. I’m not scared. (Also deeply appreciate that Gavin Robertson’s bio just reads “Not the cricketer.” And that he assumes people have heard of Gavin Robertson the cricketer. Which also brings to mind this moment from Sandpaper week back in March. (Apologies to Gavin Robertson (the cricketer))).
There have been some lies from Australian cricket the last few days but this is the final straw pic.twitter.com/RD1Zk6qseR
— Geoff Lemon Sport (@GeoffLemonSport) March 28, 2018
Updated
Richard Spiller writes in. “Hi Geoff - for those of us in England who had postponed sleep in the hope of seeing Australia finished off, BT Sport are showing (for reasons I haven’t fathomed) an Australia v India ODI at the Gabba in Jan 1986.It’s got a definite period charm – Gavaskar opening the batting wearing a sun hat, the likes of David Gilbert and Syed Kirmani, the Gabba having some individuality rather than just another stadium and commentary from Benaud, Greig et al. Hope you get some play eventually.”
That sounds better than the Test match. Also, your name. I thought Spiller... Spiller.
Then it hit me. Have a lunch dance.
“And if this ain’t love, why does it feel so good?”
Via email, Santosh Venkataraman has rallied to my flag. “India made the right decision based on two more factors. They are using a 4-man bowling attack and were able to give them some rest. The second innings by India of 106-8 showed how dangerous a follow-on would have been. What total would they have been comfortable chasing? Even a total of 120 or 100 with pressure mounting would be tricky to negotiate.” First prize is this giant teddy bear who is choosing not to adopt antiquated Victorian-era tactics.
Alright Vectron, if that is your real name. I’ll allow it.
@GeoffLemonSport Re Follow on: Could the case be made to enforce if you have a couple or more batsmen with niggling/possible serious injuries that you don't want to exercerbate if you don't need to? #AUSvIND
— Vectron44 (@vectron44) December 30, 2018
It only underlines the point that the tactic is for very specific unusual circumstances, not default use.
Lunch will be early, at 12:15
What ho! A sensible luncheon decision from an ICC official! (I know it’s not the umpires’ fault generally.) But this is great news, and not just because I get to clock off 15 minutes early. (In fact rain sessions are often the most fun on the OBO.) But it means we should get on promptly after lunch. (Another parenthetical caveat.)
Tim Hare writes in: “Looking forward later on to The Guardian writing up NZ’s series win against Sri Lanka. Four series wins on the bounce now. Incidentally, can you and your followers remember a time when only two Australians would make it into the NZ team? Definitely Gary and Cummins and then crickets.”
Tim, if they would let me write about other teams then I would be doing En Zed versus whoever followed by Zimbabwe versus Bangladesh all day long. Love the game, the whole world round. Sadly the remit of Guardian Australia is a little more specific. Also I’m watching another Test match*
(*Presently not true, granted.)
You’re not far wrong, though, as we do a player comparison for an ANZAC / ANZUS / ANZ BANK team:
Latham and Raval v Finch and Harris – three of the four aren’t much chop, but Latham is flying.
Khawaja v Williamson – no contest, but Khawaja is the only decent current Australian batsman. Why not have Kane at three and push Usman up to open?
Shaun Marsh v Ross Taylor.
Henry Nicholls v Travis Head.
Mitch Marsh v de Grandhomme – all-round superiority in both disciplines to Colin, even though he bats seven to Mitch’s six.
BJ Watling v Tim Paine – the first close one so far given the leadership and grit quotient, but Watling makes hundreds.
Pat Cummins v Neil Wagner.
Mitchell Starc v Tim Southee – maybe Tim in NZ conditions, but actually not quite. It’s close, especially in the tail-end slogging stakes.
Nathan Lyon v Ajaz Patel – no contest.
Josh Hazlewood v Trent Boult – on current form, no contest either.
The last rain is clearing Melbourne on the radar. You can bet, sure as mountains, that as soon as the surface is ready for play we’ll break for lunch.
Here’s a useful link via Liam.
A really top scientific understanding of the follow-on decision is here: https://t.co/YwsbbcOvby
— Liam Lenten (@llenten) December 30, 2018
Most notable in the abstract: “The follow-on decision problem is also briefly considered, and surprisingly, we find that the decision to enforce the follow-on or otherwise has no effect on match outcome.”
I’m getting a lot of tweets about the follow-on, which for some reason really gets people going. Let’s just make the personal record clear.
The follow-on is trash. It’s the most pointless tactical device around. People get obsessed with using it purely because they have the opportunity to use it. It’s like a milkshake maker, or a firearm.
There are a handful of times when you should enforce the follow-on.
1) You have literally bowled a team out for 50 in 30 overs.
2) Delays mean there are only three or four sessions left.
3) The forecast for subsequent days has Noah’s Ark being built.
4) The pitch is currently a minefield that will improve with time.
Other than that, what’s the point? Where’s the advantage? You work your bowlers harder and longer, deny them the chance to bowl last on a Test pitch, and either cost your batsmen a second hit or potentially make them bat to see out a draw or chase a tricky total.
If you don’t enforce it, your team gets another bat, which gives struggling batsmen the chance to make a score or dominant ones the chance to have some fun. You further deflate and tire the opposing bowlers. You give your bowlers more rest, and let them bowl last in the most helpful conditions. Winning a game on day four instead of day five doesn’t change the series scoreline. Fixating on it is just guff.
If anyone can make a compelling case the other way, fire at will.
A few people asking if any rain-seeding tactics are being used today. I’ll just say that Usman Khawaja is a qualified pilot...
(it’s still raining)
If any Australian supporters would like to feel a special breed of angst and despair, I have just the thing.
Australian centuries by calendar year:
— Ric Finlay (@RicFinlay) December 30, 2018
2001 23
2002 18
2003 25
2004 22
2005 21
2006 19
2007 6 (4 Tests)
2008 19
2009 15
2010 12
2011 8
2012 15
2013 13
2014 16
2015 21
2016 12
2017 15
2018 4
All the covers are on for the moment, large, small, and in between.
Be interesting to see what people make of the pitch once this match is done. A lot of talk about it. It looked ugly, but did it start to play better, or were Australia’s batsmen just bad enough to bring the match alive?
“There was lot of controversy on the pitch on day one, everyone seems to have gone quiet now. We were disappointed but pleased it started to come to life. We’ve got a lot of work on this pitch issue but we will do that over the next few years.”
— ABC Grandstand (@abcgrandstand) December 29, 2018
Stuart Fox, MCC CEO #AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/2MbwU1zEcc
“Just wanted to say thank you to you, Adam and Jonathan (and all the other hosts) as well as all the OBO-ers for your excellent efforts in this test and over the whole year. It’s a beacon of amusement and camaraderie and a reminder that the game is bigger than a few passing ripples in its pond.”
Thanks Ian. In all sincerity, it’s a privilege to be allowed to pilot this strange, lovely, ramshackle thing that has survived and flourished for as many years as it has.
Pat Cummins has to do everything.
Gotta feel for Pat Cummins. Out there pulling the covers on and off, while the rest of the team sit back in the dressing room sipping lattes. #AusvInd pic.twitter.com/b4PbWoDjVX
— Cat Jones (@Cricketbatcat) December 29, 2018
“Hi Geoff,” writes Jeremy. “In your preamble I reckon you’ve put your finger on exactly why I love Test cricket: this game is a piquant mix of a starry-eyed optimism that has you dreaming that your hero can bat all day and the pessimism that is the OBO’s poetic stock in trade.
“But best of all are those valiant performances in defeat; Cummins’ on-drives yesterday had the look of a captain going down with the ship and trying to hold back the waves while he was at it. And then your mind starts to play those lovely games of ‘what if?’ - sadly, in this case it’s: what if one or two of the top six had shown a tenth of Cummins’ application?”
Exactly what I was thinking yesterday. Trailing by 141, it’s not that big a gap. Wring another hundred runs out of the specialists batsmen, and we’d have an all-time classic finish on our hands. The resistance from the lower order, in any match, has a special emotional resonance, but never more than when it has this kind of substance.
And now it’s hammering rain at the MCG once more. Australia won’t mind, if this drags on a little longer then we’ll start losing overs. As vain as that hope may be. A few silly types online are already expostulating over Kohli not enforcing the follow-on, as though this is going to make a difference in the end.
“Not sure that Indian wickets afford quick bowlers much comfort,” emails John Burton about Bumrah. That’s the perception, but there has been a concerted effort to produce more pace-friendly pitches at times in Indian domestic cricket, which is partly where this generation of excellent quicks has come from. And if that’s where India’s advantage lies in any given series, you can bet that the ground staff at various venues will respond appropriately.
It keeps changing. Play was due to start at 11. Then the covers came back on. Now they’re off again.
Word from Melbourne’s northern suburbs is that there’s rain coming down there, and thunder. The weather on the radar seems to be coming west to east, and it looks like there’s another band of rain maybe an hour away. I suspect it’ll clear up by the afternoon, so bear with us.
The hessian is being stripped. It’s Christmas all over again. The umpires will do an inspection shortly.
On again, off again ... Blocker Wilson overseeing proceedings. pic.twitter.com/dD4g93hoe0
— Andrew Faulkner (@AndrewFaulkner9) December 29, 2018
The time for a start has arrived, but the morning showers are still showering at the ground. The TV broadcasters at Seven are doing a panel on selection with Gideon Haigh and Peter Lalor from The Australian, which is owned by the company that also owns Foxtel, where the broadcast is doing something else.
The covers are stripped back to the hessian layers, so we won’t be delayed by much.
Updated
This is the kind of niche specialist content that Collins can bring you.
Ian Gould, officiating this week, had a chance to win the MCG Test as a sub fielder on the Border/Thomson/Botham/Tavare/Miller morning in 1982. https://t.co/FawJsCsFNh
— Adam Collins (@collinsadam) December 29, 2018
Also this morning, keep an eye on Jasprit Bumrah. He currently has 47 wickets and is playing his 9th Test. So he can’t quite get to 50 in 9, like Mohammad Abbas so memorably threatened to do for Pakistan this year. But he’s very close, and if he takes 10 Tests he’ll still be the fastest Indian seamer to the mark by a distance. (Ravi Ashwin holds the Indian record with 9 Tests, Terror Turner holds the all-time record with 6 Tests.) For Bumrah, it’s a truly remarkable rise for someone who was an unknown curiosity bowler in the IPL a few years ago, who only debuted in Tests this year, and who’s never had the comfort of playing at home.
Updated
Now, the weather. “Tell me how we feel about the weather,” says the poet Derrick Brown. “Talk about the moon, but not about how it f–––s up our blood.” The weather has its emotional impact on us all, and cricket players or watchers are among the most concretely affected. Rain can be saviour or tormentor. There is some rain around Melbourne this morning, and a bit of grumbling thunder even now. But the forecast and the radar show patchy bits, so it won’t be enough to wash out a day. We might lose a bit of time, but even that’s unlikely with the umpires showing on day four how late they’re willing to play with the floodlights on. I’ll keep you posted, but rain isn’t expected to play a role.
Here’s that poem, if you want to feel something for a few minutes while we wait.
Preamble
I like believing in impossible things. That’s one of the attractions of cricket – there’s always the chance that a certain day will be special, a day on which you may see something no one has seen before. And most of the time you don’t, but very occasionally you do.
Which isn’t to say that I’m entertaining the idea of Australia winning this Test match. 141 runs behind, with only the No11 yet to bat, on a fifth-day pitch that has misbehaved since day two, against a bowling attack with strong claims to being the best in the world. This isn’t England in Adelaide in 2017, or even Australia in Adelaide a couple of weeks ago. Coming into the last day those times there was at least an outside chance. Here it’s numerically just not an option.
But perhaps the three remaining batsmen – Pat Cummins, Nathan Lyon and Josh Hazlewood – could at least have a last day that’s memorable. Perhaps they can bat for an hour, or get the deficit under 100. Perhaps Cummins could make a hundred of his own. Perhaps a lot of things, the beauty of which is that we never know.
I won’t build it up too much, because they could equally lose two wickets in the first over and we’ll be done. But even if that happens, it doesn’t detract from how special Cummins and Lyon were last night. Batting on, and on, and on, into the dark. Batting until 5:30. Having the session extended almost half an hour to get the overs in. Having it extended another half hour because they were eight wickets down. And battling through all that, in the gloom, under the floodlights, against Jasprit Bumrah sending the ball flying and Ravindra Jadeja whirring away on a length, defending and at times counter-attacking, especially the crisp drives Cummins unfurled once he approached his half-century.
What an effort from those Australian bowling batsmen after a match in which they’ve worked so hard. It was special already, and it could get a little more special this morning. What could be equally special is India taking a series lead with one match to play, uncharted territory for an Indian team on these shores. Whatever form any specialness takes, I’ll let you know.
