India’s dominance over Australia in the bilateral Test series finally ended as they lost the five-match series by 1-3 on Sunday, January 5.
The Asian Giants ended up losing the fifth and final Test by six wickets in Sydney and failed to retain the Border Gavaskar Trophy for the first time since 2015. A lot of things went wrong for India across five Tests, be it the change of leadership, constant shuffling of the batting line-up and the misfiring of the bowling attack.
There were several reasons which collectively brought India’s downfall in Australia, preventing them from scripting a hat-trick of series wins down under despite getting off to a good start in the series. As India ended their second cycle of the World Test Championship (WTC) on a disappointing note with the Australia series loss, let’s have a look at what exactly went wrong for the Rohit Sharma-led side down under:
Batting failure
Apart from the second innings of the first Test, Indian batting hardly looked in any control as they surrendered in front of the relentless Australian bowling attack. The Indian batting crossed the 300-run mark just once out of the nine innings as compared to Australia who crossed 300 runs thrice in the series.
Yashasvi Jaiswal (391 runs) and Nitish Kumar Reddy (298 runs) were the top two scorers for the visitors as the senior players such as Virat Kohli (190 runs) and Rohit Sharma (31 runs) failed to play impactful knocks. In Adelaide and Melbourne, India needed some more runs on the board which could well have shifted the balance of the game.
Team Selection
India went in with three specialist seamers and two all-rounders in the first Test which pretty much turned out to be their template for the rest of the tour. The move worked in Perth as the visitors managed to register a massive 295-run win to go 1-0 up in the series.
However, as the series progressed, India were forced to do a lot of chopping and changing — first to include captain Rohit Sharma in the playing XI, who missed the first Test and later to allow him to open the innings. As a result, the top order could never settle, resulting in the loss of form for KL Rahul. Furthermore, the fragile batting lineup also didn’t allow the inclusion of a specialist seamer, which again proved to be disastrous.
Lack of support for Jasprit Bumrah
Jasprit Bumrah etched his name in the history books as he registered the best-ever performance by an Indian bowler in a Test series in Australia. The right-arm speedster finished as the highest wicket-taker across five Tests with 32 wickets from five matches (nine innings) at an average of 13.06 with three five-wicket hauls. As a result, he was deservedly adjudged Player of the Series despite India ending up on the losing side.
However, Bumrah failed to get support from his teammates who just failed to emulate his heroics. Bumrah’s new-ball partner, Mohammed Siraj, picked 20 wickets from five matches at an average of 31.15 with best figures of 4/98. Apart from Siraj, the inexperienced trio of Akash Deep (5 wickets at an average of 54), Harshit Rana (4 wickets at an average of 50.75) and Nitish Kumar Reddy (5 wickets at an average of 38) also failed to shine on their maiden tour to Australia. As a result, Bumrah had to do much of the heavy lifting and was often the lone warrior in the Indian pace attack.
Poor Captaincy
India captain Rohit Sharma came into the limelight time and again throughout the series for his failure to maintain control of the game. Whenever India had Australia on the backfoot after a flurry of wickets, the hosts managed to claw their way back into the match with a game-changing partnership.
Rohit was often seen going into ultra-defensive mode, especially in the second innings of the Melbourne Test when India could’ve pressed on Australia and bundled them out quickly to set up the match. However, the India skipper played the waiting game, allowing Australia to make a comeback. The same happened in Brisbane when his lack of proactive captaincy allowed Travis Head and Steve Smith to forge a massive partnership.
Virat Kohli-Rohit Sharma failure
Indian seniors Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma failed to have an impact in the series as they were found out big time against the potent Australian attack. Rohit Sharma joined the team after missing the first Test and came on to bat in the middle order. The India skipper failed to adapt to the new batting position and forced himself to open again in Melbourne, but failure followed him everywhere. Rohit could only accumulate 31 runs from six innings with even the likes of Jasprit Bumrah and Akash Deep outscoring him.
Apart from Rohit, Kohli also didn’t have a memorable time with the bat despite scoring a century in the first Test in Perth. Since then, the India batter continued to fall prey to his outside-off weakness, which was very well exploited by Australian bowlers who managed to keep him quiet throughout the series. As a result, the Indian batting star could only accumulate 190 runs from nine innings and became one of the major reasons for India’s downfall.