Once Beaten, Twice Bowled: India Botch Up Art Of Leaving

India's reply limited by dismissals of Gill, their most in-form batter, and Pujara, the best acclimatised player, after bowlers fight hard on Day 2

- ASHISH MAGOTRA

Scene 1. Scott Boland is a bit like Jasprit Bumrah. A bit. Remember how Bumrah delivers the ball at an angle; how he seems to bend his back outwards before bringing the ball into the right-hander? The same is also true of Boland, albeit with a small difference.

The orthodox alignment that we see with many bowlers — they try to keep their body parts moving in straight lines towards the batsman — is missing. His arm also comes in from an angle and pushes everything in towards the right-hander. That is his natural delivery and if Shubman Gill would have known that, he would not have shouldered arms to that delivery from the right-arm pacer; he would not have been clean bowled after making 13.

Scene 2. Cheteshwar Pujara had prepared for this tour. He had spent time in county cricket and done the hard work.

The Aussies knew that too and if he got stuck in, he would bat time. This time, it wasn’t Boland though. It was Cameron Green. The ball was fullish, outside the off-stump, and it seamed in to hit the top of off-stump. Pujara, like Gill, shouldered arms and watched the ball hit the stumps. He made 14.

Two not-so-well-left dismissals had India in the kind of trouble they would have loved to do without in the final of the World Test Championship at The Oval in London.

The fall of Pujara’s wicket reduced Rohit Sharma’s team to 50/3 and given that Australia had scored 469 in their first innings, the signs were anything but good.

Costly no ball?