Ashwin led bowler’s unit saves the day in Adelaide

Last updated on December 21st, 2020 at 05:31 am

Ashwin led bowler’s unit: Someone had rightly said that test test is Ravichandran Ashwin’s game as it was proved yesterday when the bowler gave a master class on how to handle tricky situations in which the Indian team was put in. 

On Friday senior off-spinner Ashwin displayed one of his best performances overseas as the attack led by him was followed by other Indian bowlers that forced Australian team into surrendering its game. The Indian bowlers limited the Australian greatness to 191 on the second day of the first Day/Night test. 

The first innings score was below the standard score but courtesy Ashwin, the team successfully managed to dodge the attack of skipper Tim Paine who scored 73 off 99 balls. He was the only batsman from the Australian side to have put up some show. 

Indian lost its way when once again the defence of Prithvi Shaw was shattered by the Australian attack despite the Indian team having 53 run lead in the first innings. Shaw went back to pavilion during the end at 9/1. 

The bowling attack can be classified in three phases starting with Indian ace Jasprit Bumrah (21-7-52-2). His strategy was to target the batsmen with full length deliveries so as to restrict variations from the opposite side. 

Ashwin came into the picture during the evening as he did not leave any alternative for the batsmen with his perfect delivery length and also effectively used the bounce in the pitch to target the middle order. It was followed by Umesh Yadav (16.1-5-0-3) also loved up to the mark and effectively ended the journey of dangerous Marnus Labuschagne and Pat Cummins. 

As far as Mohammed Shami is concerned, even though the bowler gave a lot of variations and was good from his side but was let down by the fielders, which was the only shortcoming that the team had.