Indian cricket team poised for Third test at fortress Gabba: Another acid test!

Sanjoy Roy

December 12, 2024   

The Gabba or Brisbane has long been considered as Australia’s fortress, a venue where the home team has historically conquered and subjugated the opposition teams. Thus, Brisbane Cricket Ground or the Gabba is heralded as the fortress of Australia Cricket Team for their enviable record at the venue. Between 1989 and 2020, Australia went unbeaten at the Gabba. None of the visiting teams could come close to beating Australia until India in 2021 with the famous win. For India, this ground has been a place of both disappointment and accomplishment, encompassing the highs and lows of cricketing battles down under. As India is ready for their next Test match at this iconic venue commencing on December 14, 2024, it is worthwhile to see their records here, marked by one of the most memorable victories in Test cricket history and several tough losses. Out of the seven Test matches, Indians have played at this ground, India have managed to win only one, a remarkable feat achieved in January 2021. That victory came after 32 years of Australian invincibility at the Gabba, breaking a record that had stood since West Indies last defeated Australia there in 1988. In that historic match, Rishabh Pant’s unbeaten 89 guided India to a chase of 328 with noteworthy contributions of 91 by Shuvman Gill and a patient knock of 56 by Chetashwar Pujara, sealing a series victory against all odds.

 

Given the above history, Indians supporters should neither be too much excited and enthused for the repeat of January 2021, nor should they contemplate anything extraordinary from the crest-fallen existing Indian team, which is almost out of the coming Test Championship final. The repeated collapses of batting should be the real concern for Coach Gautam Gambhir and Skipper Rohit Sharma in the coming test and it needs to be arrested somehow to restore the confidence back. One striking symptom of the present team is that the batting collapse starts with early dismissal of Yashasvi  Jaiswal. The middle order batters are now very wobbly with no batter found confident enough, who can stretch the innings longer and consume at least 180 to 200 balls with a strike rate of 30 to 35% as Pujara did after the retirement of Rahul Dravid from Test Cricket as a player. The poor forms of Rohit Sharma and Virat kohli buttressed by the uncertainty of Risav Pant warrants the inclusion of one extra batter in the side , which India had been following but since Kohli had become skipper of the team , the composition on five specialist batters , 5 specialist bowlers theory came into being . As none of existing top five specialist batters can bowl or bowl 5 to 6 six overs in every innings of opposition team(s), the necessity of including five bowlers has become a necessity causing the some inherent disadvantages to the team as well. The theory and belief of 5 batters, 5 bowlers with a wicket-keeper batter proved wrong and costlier in the Newzealand series rendering India totally out of the next Test championship final. Thus time has come for a reconsideration of the existing stand. Recently it is found that Nitish Reddy, an all-rounder is inducted in the side instead of sixth specialist batter , but how far he would be able to fill up the role of sixth batter is not known but he can bat and also bowl with medium pace and thus it is upto team management to continue or discontinue him.

 

But the problem for the Indian team is the poor batting display by so called star batters. When opening batters particularly Jaiswal becomes successful at the top, other batsman can also score runs easily but this is not the sign of the good team. The same scenario had prevailed once upon a time in Indian team and it was noticed that “when Sachin Tendulkar would get runs, other batsmen could score runs’. However, the scenario got changed when Sourav Ganguly took reign of the team as skipper and it continued for a long time. But now the situation seems very ominous particularly during the last three or four Test series, mainly because of the successive poor batting or average batting forms of almost all middle order batters barring few exceptions. The failures of top three batters cannot be recompensed or filled up by other and lower order batters in circumstances when the opposing team scores  healthy , say more than 400 runs in an innings, higher than the scores of Indian team. Thus the Gabba test is an acid test not only for Indian batters on the bouncy track but also for the team management including the selectors of BCCI. Rohit Sharma and Gambhir might be worried with average performance of Shuvman Gill, inconsistent performance of K L Rahul plagued by uncertainty of Risav Pant and Virat Kohli in the batting line up. The question arises whom the Coach and Skipper should depend or trust at this critical juncture in the bowling department when except Jasprit Bumrah, none of the medium first bowlers --- Harshit Rana, Mohd. Siraj or Nitish Reddy was proved alarming and threatening to the Kangaroo batters on the bowling friendly pitch of Adelaide.

 

Thus to me, challenges lie on the bowling front as well because whenever Indian bowlers see a bouncy track as found in Perth and Adelaide, either they dislike to pitch it short fearing  hammered by Australian batsmen as done by Travis Head in the match at Adelaide, in the last world Test championship final and  2023 ODI world cup cricket tournament held in India  as many Australian batters are much adept and good players of the back foot horizontal shots or they fail to maintain an aggressive line of attack bowling at a distance of  6 to 8 meter area away from the popping crease of batters  or outside the off stamp called as corridor of uncertainty. So, bowling is also a weak link of the existing Indian team visiting Australia as situation evinces. The mindset of bowlers needs a sea-change and too much reliance on Bumrah is not an ideal scenario as it may render him injured as first bowlers are susceptible to injury. But it’s for the fast bowlers to bowl on consistent line and lengths and put Australian batters to test with good bouncers consistently without the fear of being hammered for four or sixes over the fine leg or squre leg areas with adequate thrusts given, more importantly for fielders to hold onto all the catches, especially in the slips that would matter most. It is fact that inexperienced Harshit Rana and over-excited Siraj did not bowl well in the Adelaide coupled with the massive failures of all batters. Except Bumrah and Ashwin/ Jadeja , there is hardly any bowler who can guarantee a hope among the existing bowling attack. Thus the team management has called for inducting Modh Shami, who had been rested for his injury sustained during the last world cup tournament.

 

In fine, it may be mentioned that the best chance for doing something amazing in Australia by the team India lies and depends on its batting might and prowess. If batting clicks and they can score big like 400 runs plus, securing a draw or even a victory would  not be unlikely in this Australian fortress or even in other grounds as well like Melboune and Sydney as Sourav Ganguly led team had exhibited during 2003-04 series across Australia.  With a view to saving the long standing batting supremacy, newly appointed Indian coach Gautam Gambhir should think out of box. He should consider injecting and ameliorating confidence on the players first before making slender changes in the composition if needed but restoring the batting strength should be the first priority of his sermon.

   (Tripurainfo)