5 Reasons Why India Lost The Pune Test Against Australia

Feb 25, 2017 at 5:20 PM

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5 Reasons Why India Lost The Pune Test Against Australia

The much-anticipated Border-Gavaskar Trophy began on a rather nose diving note for the hosts as they were handed a stinging 333-run defeat by Australia in the opening Test of the four-match series at the MCA Stadium, Pune. The loss also ended India’s unbeaten streak of 19 Test matches in a row and also gave Virat Kohli his first defeat as a captain since he took the full-time role in 2015.

After being rolled over for just 105 in the first innings batting in reply to Australia’s 260, India failed to show any fightback and gave up easily in the second innings too. Chasing a 441-run target, India were bundled out for just 107, much to the disappointment of the home crowd. Here are the five reasons why India lost to Australia in Pune:

  1. Blunders with DRS:

Australia simply outclassed, outmatched and outplayed India in every department, including the Decision Review System. It seemed that India badly needs a crash course on DRS to learn about the finer aspects of judging the right and wrong calls. Kohli and his team had a disastrous time in taking those reviews. For the fact, only one of seven decision’s reviewed went in India’s favor. These faulty calls cost India badly as they suffered more than a couple of times at the hands of the opposition, who got dismissals without any challenge as India had no review left on most occasions.

2. Poor Catching:

The Australians took catches while the Indians did not. This can be one of the biggest difference between both sides. Australia were spot on in grabbing almost all opportunities that came on the field. While India fumbled right from Day 1 and appeared very mediocre. In fact, Steven Smith would have never been able to reach the special century had he been caught at 22 and not been given four more lives at various stages of his innings thereafter.

3. No resilience from the batting order:

Team totals of 105 & 107 was not expected from the Indian side that dominated New Zealand and England. They were in supreme form and enjoying their sweet unbeaten streak of 19 matches. But the Australian bowlers gave them a rude awakening and burst the safe comfort bubble they were sitting inside. The batsman simple did do justice to all the run making they indulged in the past couple of series. While the Steve O’Keefe and Lyon and Starc to some extent might have come as a surprise, they could have taken the safety first approach after being as ked to deal with an improbable target. But there was no resilience shown whatsoever and Aussies registered a win which looked as easy as snap opening a beer can.

4. Ashwin and Jadeja miss the tricks:

Indian spin duo of Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja were brilliantly taken care off by the Australians. The danger of facing these two was in the minds of the Aussies and they prepared well to face India’s biggest weapons at home. The perfection with which the tourist denied Ashwin and Jadeja were such that they were never able to claim wickets in clumps as they were doing in recent times. With the opposition spinners scripting a wonderful win for their team, the India duo certainly missed the tricks. Of course, there were dropped catches and they had pretty satisfying figures at the end of each innings. But all of those efforts were mediocre and failed to have any impact.

5. The New South Wales Flavour:

The mood in Australia would be happy. But guess what? The mood in New South Wales would be party likes as three of its stars Steve O’ Keefe, Steve Smith and Mitchell Starc were chief architects of the win, which was Australia’s first since October 29, 2004. The first name surely needs no introduction as of now. Steve O’ Keefe is easily the main cause India lost the match. The bowler, who is on his first trip to India, wasn’t seen as a danger man and everyone had their eyes on Nathan Lyon. However,  the left arm spinner spun a vicious web around the Indians and cloned performance of 6/35 in both the innings to ensure smooth victory. Steve Smith and Mitchell Starc played vital roles with the bat. The latter hit a quick 61-run knock to take Australia to 260 in the first innings while Smith ensured that they committed no blunder in taking advantage of a huge lead which the Indians conceded. The skipper cracked a century while swelling up the overall lead of 440 and setting an improbable target for India.

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