Adelaide, Dec 6, 2024
Opener Nathan McSweeney and Marnus Labuschagne blunted India’s bowlers in a solid show of discipline and defence to help Australia reach 86/1 in 33 overs and trail the visitors by 94 runs at stumps on day one of the day-night second Test at the Adelaide Oval here on Friday.
After Mitchell Starc recorded career-best figures of 6-48 to help Australia bundled out India for 180, McSweeney (38 not out) and Labuschagne (20 not out) survived a tough period of batting under lights where the pink ball did a lot of movement for India’s seamers, who didn’t attack stumps much to cause trouble and took only one wicket.
In the final session, Jasprit Bumrah’s mastery on display saw him squaring up McSweeney and finding his outside edge. Rishabh Pant dived to his right to take the catch but only managed to get his fingertips on the ball. Rohit Sharma couldn’t grab the catch on the rebound as the ball hit his right wrist, giving McSweeney a life on three.
Bumrah finally had a wicket when Usman Khawaja just fended at a length ball that bounced and took the outside edge to slip. The under-pressure Labuschagne took 19 balls to get off the mark before flicking off Siraj to get his first boundary.
On the other hand, McSweeney began to be comfortable in pulling and punching for his boundaries, before hitting Nitish Kumar Reddy for back-to-back fours. He and Labuschagne hit a couple of boundaries to stitch an unbroken 62-run stand for the second wicket, as Australia ended the opening day of the day-night match in favour.
Brief scores:
India 180 all out in 44.1 overs (Nitish Kumar Reddy 42, K.L. Rahul 37; Mitchell Starc 6-48, Pat Cummins 2-41) lead Australia 86/1 in 33 overs (Nathan McSweeney 38 not out, Marnus Labuschagne 20 not out; Jasprit Bumrah 1-13) by 94 runs.(Agency)
