India vs Australia 3rd Test: Indore Pitch Was A Joke But Only Aussies Left Smiling

Indore:  The flip side of providing such poor pitches like the one at the Holkar Cricket Stadium at Indore is that sooner or later, the home team too shall come to grief on it. India were well and truly outplayed in the third Test of the Border Gavaskar Trophy series, not just by the Australians but also their own inability to handle quality spin. For a batting line-up that boasts so many thousands of runs, the sum total of their batting effort was modest to poor, and made to look more so by the manner in which the visitors handled the dodgy situation. There was never going to be any debate about the criticism of the pitch, the manner in which the Australians bowled and batted was far better than whatever India could provide.

A nine-wicket loss on a track that was always questionable is quite a testament on how the two sides handled the situation. More so when you consider that the visitors lost a wicket in the very first over.

India batted poorly in the first inning and that more or less decided the series.

Even in the second inning, the difference between the Indian and Australian efforts was visible. While the Indian batter played beside the pad and often were done by the float from Nathan Lyon, the Australian batters used the bat as much as possible, and the result was evident.

For all their efforts, Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja never managed to get through the defences of Travis Head and Marnus Labuschagne. In fact, they didn’t even get close.

There was always a lot of talk about how the pitches have been in India for the series. Just because the Australians were unable to handle the conditions in Nagpur and Delhi, the discussions were restricted to their batting failures.

However, it a sobering thought – how would the series have stood had the pitches been a little less daunting.

The Indian batters were challenged in Delhi and it was only a dramatic collapse by the rivals that made things easy for them. Barring the only inning in Nagpur, the Indian batters were never ever quite comfortable, which has hardly good news.

As for the bowling, while the spinners were really good, they were made to look that much better by the sheer panic batting by Australia in the first two games. Once they got their act together, the spinners didn’t look anywhere as penetrative.

One wonders what sort of pitch will be on display in Ahmedabad, but one thing is for sure – Australia may have missed out on the Border Gavaskar Trophy once again, but they are well and truly still in it to level the series.