Aussies face tough task to level series
Monday, 10 November 2008
Australia need a further 369 runs to win the fourth and final Test against India after closing the penultimate day on 13-0 in reply, BBC reports.
India raced to 116-0 with Virender Sehwag hitting 92 before they lost three quick wickets, including Sourav Ganguly first ball in his final Test second innings.
Mahendra Dhoni struck 55 and shared 108 with Harbhajan Singh (52) who made his sixth Test fifty.
India, who lead the series 1-0, ended their second innings on 295 all out.
The tourists took 13 from the first over in Nagpur, but with the record winning last-innings score in India of 276, they look poised to lose a series for the first time since the 2005 Ashes.
With such attention now paid to Twenty20 matches, much has made of the often negative passages of play in this series, but the penultimate day perfectly demonstrated the absorbing, subtle fluctuations that are so unique to Test cricket.
India had been coasting along with Sehwag scoring fluently at will.
Proving the theory that runs are much easier with the newer, harder ball, Sehwag reached his 17th Test fifty with his sixth four.
He moved into the 90s by dispatching a Jason Krejza full toss through mid-wicket for four more and Australian hopes looked distinctly remote, with the majority of their fielders sent out to the boundary instead of in catching positions.
Krejza, who conceded 67 from his first 11 overs, continued to give the ball air, despite being hit straight down the ground for six in the first over after lunch by Sehwag.
But Shane Watson, who was deceptively hostile, utilised reverse swing to trap Murali Vijay and nipped one away to take the edge of the out-of-touch Rahul Dravid.
India raced to 116-0 with Virender Sehwag hitting 92 before they lost three quick wickets, including Sourav Ganguly first ball in his final Test second innings.
Mahendra Dhoni struck 55 and shared 108 with Harbhajan Singh (52) who made his sixth Test fifty.
India, who lead the series 1-0, ended their second innings on 295 all out.
The tourists took 13 from the first over in Nagpur, but with the record winning last-innings score in India of 276, they look poised to lose a series for the first time since the 2005 Ashes.
With such attention now paid to Twenty20 matches, much has made of the often negative passages of play in this series, but the penultimate day perfectly demonstrated the absorbing, subtle fluctuations that are so unique to Test cricket.
India had been coasting along with Sehwag scoring fluently at will.
Proving the theory that runs are much easier with the newer, harder ball, Sehwag reached his 17th Test fifty with his sixth four.
He moved into the 90s by dispatching a Jason Krejza full toss through mid-wicket for four more and Australian hopes looked distinctly remote, with the majority of their fielders sent out to the boundary instead of in catching positions.
Krejza, who conceded 67 from his first 11 overs, continued to give the ball air, despite being hit straight down the ground for six in the first over after lunch by Sehwag.
But Shane Watson, who was deceptively hostile, utilised reverse swing to trap Murali Vijay and nipped one away to take the edge of the out-of-touch Rahul Dravid.