Key events
41st over: Australia 108-3 (Labuschagne 31, Head 5) Oh my cuss. Siraj gets his Lionel Richie on and beats Head three times in the over! The wobble seam is deployed and beats Head twice in succession before the batter then decides to throw the kitchen sink, toaster and fridge at a length ball but connects only with the Adelaide breeze. A maiden. Phew.
41st over: Australia 108-3 (Labuschagne 31, Head 5) Travis Head arrives in the middle. This is Box Office stuff. Head leaves his first ball but is then beaten all ends up by his second, feet in quicksand as Bumrah spears one past his outside edge. That was so close, the pink ball passing the edge by a Mr Creosote wafffer thin distance. Bosh! Bumrah goes a shade too full and Head clobbers him through cover for four.
Sing it, Damien.
WICKET! Smith c Pant b Bumrah 2 (Australia 103-3)
Steve Smith is strangled down the leg side! What a sickener! An innocuous delivery and an attempted leg glance from Smith that Pant safely snaffles. Smith can’t believe he’s done that, he throws his head back and stomps off the pitch like a toddler denied a lollipop.
40th over: Australia 103-2 (Labuschagne 31, Smith 2) Siraj gets another ball to jag and spit off the surface, Smith gets a thick outside edge off it that falls short of gully. After saying it looked a good day for batting this pitch has looked quite lively at the start of day two. Marnus drives down the ground and they run a lesser-spotted but always satisfying all run four, that’s the hundred up for Australia.
39th over: Australia 97-2 (Labuschagne 26, Smith 1) Australia approach the team three figures. Every run feels crucial at the moment. Bumrah oversteps this time to gift one more. Smith is on the front foot, willing himself to get forward and blunt the threat from Bumrah. He survives but can’t get away from the danger end.
38th over: Australia 96-2 (Labuschagne 26, Smith 1) Siraj joins the dots but oversteps to add one to the total. Marnus is solid in defence and gets his hands out of the way to leave well alone a ball outside off that darts back a bit off the pitch. The pink ball glinting under the afternoon sun, looks like plenty of lacquer still on it. Lacquer is a good word, isn’t it? Lacquer. Mmmm.
37th over: Australia 95-2 (Labuschagne 26, Smith 1) Here comes Steve Smith, is the gimlet eye fading? He’ll need both peepers laser focused to repel Bumrah with his dander up.
A forward poke sees Smith off the mark with an inside edge into the leg side. Marnus then leans on a full ball and works it wide of mid-on for his second three of the morning. Three slips in place, both sides going toe-to-toe. Absorbing stuff.
WICKET! McSweeney c Pant b Bumrah 39 (Australia 91-2)
Bumrah Strikes! Nothing McSweeney could do about that really, angled in from wide of the crease and then rearing up and shaping away at the last moment, the ball taking the outside edge and flying to Pant behind the stumps. India are in amongst them.
Speaking of painful extractions, solidarity to Thomas Bancroft (presumably no relation) who is following both Test matches whilst overcoming a Wisdom tooth removal procedure. Whisky and cricket is it Thomas? Sounds like a good treatment plan.
36th over: Australia 91-1 (McSweeney 39, Labuschagne 23) Siraj wheels off in celebratory raptures a la Stuart Broad after scudding one into Marnus’ front pad but then the bowler looks a smidge silly as the umpire says no and Rohit doesn’t call for a review, correctly indicating there was a meaty inside edge onto pad to save Marnus.
35th over: Australia 90-1 (McSweeney 39, Labuschagne 23) Jasprit Bumrah starts with a maiden, angled in at pace, pink ball darting off the surface like a cobra’s tongue. Good luck, lads.
34th over: Australia 90-1 (McSweeney 39, Labuschagne 23) Mohammed Siraj bustles in to Marnus. A couple of slips and a gully in place. Runs straight away! Marnus whips a ball from outside off through the leg side, doesn’t gave the legs for a boundary but three runs to start the day. Positive intent from the beleaguered batter. McSweeney defends the next four balls as Siraj lands it on a good length, a single off the final balls sees four runs PLUNDERED off the first over.
Here come the players, let’s do this. The sun is beating down in Adelaide, mocking my double sock and thermals get up here in London. It looks a day for batting, can India winkle a few early and get back into this match. Only one way to find out! PLAY
“More power to your typing fingers, and may the goddess of sleeping toddlers smile kindly on your household!” Brendon Murley gets the none existent prize for first email of the day! (Get in touch, for the love of all that is holy, details on the left flank of this page)
Ah, the Goddess of sleeping toddlers! Smiling? She’s been gurning and blowing raspberries for the past three years Brendon, as my capacious eye bags will testify. Who needs sleep though? Especially when there is a Smörgåsbord of Antipodean Test matches to tuck into.
Run (s) Run (s) Rudolph Marnus!
“All I want for Christmas is a rock n roll ‘lectric guitar career saving 12th Test century.”
Catchy.
Marnus and McSweeney grafted away under lights last evening, can they make it count this morning and both go on to make a chatter halting score? It’ll be a fascinating first hour, it always is, isn’t it?
Both men would love to be able to crack on and will be harbouring desires of half centuries at the least. I’m harbouring desires for a 3.34am UK time cup of coffee but daren’t pad down the hallway past a snoring three year old in case of a floorboard creak and an early hours wake up that could really put the cat amongst the pigeons toddlers ‘mongst the OBOs.
This Test is ticking along at a fair old lick but pales in comparison to the warp speed happenings over the ditch. England have fired up the afterburners in Wellington. I’ll forgive you for joining Rob Smyth for a few overs on t’other OBO, make sure you come back, mind.
The Rory Burns play of the day:
Geoff was indeed in fine fettle yesterday, as was another cloud busting bloke with a wavy barnet – Mitchell Starc.
Sporting songs from the outer are usually dross, partly because they’re most often sung tunelessly by annoying drunks, and partly because they usually consist of one cringey couplet jammed with no consideration of cadence or metre into the scarcely heeded melodic line of a mid-tier radio hit. The few that are slightly more artful stand out, appearing far better by virtue of their company than they might objectively deserve. One such of recent years that provides occasional enjoyment is: “Hark, the herald angels sing – Mitchell Starc, the new-ball king.”
The phrasing fits, the use of a Christmas hymn is seasonally apt for Australia in December or January, and the sentiment reflects a cricketing truth. Starc with a lacquered Kookaburra (while that sounds a strange object to possess without context) is a menace. But swap out the lyrics of “new-ball” for “pink-ball” and it would be even more apt. In the day-night Test format, nobody has done it better.
Preamble
James Wallace
Hello and welcome to what promises to be a intriguing second say with the pink ball at the Adelaide Oval. Australia got themselves back into the Border Gavaskar series yesterday by landing a few punches on India’s well groomed chops, bloodying their opponents nose under lights and finishing day one just 86 runs behind with nine first innings wickets in hand.
James Wallace here in a stormy London town, I’ve got the honour of being on the tools for the first half of the day before m’esteemed colleague Jonathan Howcroft tags in to hoop the OBO about under darkening skies later on.
Play will be underway in just over 40 minutes time, here’s Geoff Lemon’s report of a dominant Aussie display on day one to whet your whistle:
