By IANS
Melbourne : India’s overcautious approach led to their losing both the openers for 31 runs off 22 overs in reply to Australia’s first-innings score of 343 at lunch on the second day of the first Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) here Thursday.
India failed to get a good start as regular opener Wasim Jaffer fell caught behind off Brett Lee for four in the ninth over and in the last over before lunch the makeshift opener Rahul Dravid’s painful existence ended when he was plumb in front to Stuart Clark for five off 66 balls.
Dravid survived a dropped catch in the gully by Phil Jaques and was then caught at first slip by Matthew Hayden off a Mitchell Johnson no ball before getting off the mark after 41 deliveries.
Dravid’s tortuous occupied 98 minutes from 66 balls. V.V.S. Laxman, meanwhile, tried to push the scoring and was on 21 at the break.
Australia could add only six more runs to their overnight score of 9-337 before Clark was caught at long leg, hooking Zaheer Khan, for 21 to end a productive 31-run stand with Johnson for the last wicket.
Zaheer finished with four wickets for 94 runs as an ideal foil to his skipper Anil Kumble whose five wickets for 84 runs on Boxing Day brought India back into the game after Australia looked set for a huge total after the first session.
India were looking down the barrel when openers Matthew Hayden and Phil Jaques put on 135 for the first wicket. But, Kumble and Zaheer bowled India to a position of relative strength as they claimed nine wickets for 202 runs in the last two sessions.
Hayden continued his love affair with the MCG, scoring his sixth hundred in seven seasons and, in the process, became the seventh player to have scored thousand Test runs at the historic venue.
The talking point on the first day of the Test, however, was India’s remarkable comeback to dismiss Australia for a score that would make India fancy their chances, even though they will have to bat last on a pitch, which Hayden, feels will not be easy to bat on.
Australia has not lost a series at home since Richie Richardson’s West Indian team beat them in 1992-93, though India came very close to winning the series last time when they were here in 2003.