Key events
118th over: India 367-9 (Reddy 113, Siraj 3) Single first ball! Happy to let Siraj face the spin of Lyon. Interesting. Siraj might need to look for a run here rather than block out five balls. And he does so! A little prod behind point, nicely done. Reddy sweeps a couple of runs square. Then charges Lyon and smites four! That’s the stuff. When you may not have many opportunities to face, got to take the ones you get, and the young century-maker has been happy taking on Lyon all series. Down the ground this time. But can’t find the run from the sixth ball to keep strike. Cummins with a full over to Siraj could be the codicil.
117th over: India 359-9 (Reddy 106, Siraj 2) Cummins to bowl, Reddy to resume on a century, the onlookers cheer… and he plays a forward defence. Nice. Blocks out a couple and then decides to take the single fourth ball of the over, not fifth or sixth. So he’s decided to trust Siraj from the outset. Not so much that they take a possible run when Siraj blocks a ball into the midwicket gap. He spars at the sixth, down the line of the stumps, and it goes by the edge.
Players are coming onto the field. Some Indian squad members are still taking high catches as the umpires walk out. That’s dedication. Now they’re on the move.
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The special part of yesterday was Reddy’s innings, one that he couldn’t have assembled without the partnership support from Washington Sundar. So that’s what I wrote about at stumps.
Preamble
Geoff Lemon
Day 4, and the match is still is alive. I love that for us. December 28th may be known forevermore as Nitish Kumar Reddy Day. That’s unlikely, but it wouldn’t be outrageous if it happened. It was one hell of an innings from the young player to assemble his first century in Tests and to do so from No 8 in the order. India still trail by a lot, 116 runs, but they have a path towards at least scrapping this out for a draw, or if they happen to bowl well in the third innings then they could be in the frame for a win.
So the scores are: Australia 474, India 358-9. Of course, the advantage is still very much with Australia, and all they have to do is bat decently in the third innings to put a win out of reach for India, and shoot for one themselves.
First, though, they need to finish off Reddy. He reached 105 not out by the time bad light and rain ended play early on Day 3. He’s still there, and he’ll have strike. But he only has Mohammed Siraj for company. So this could all be over in a couple of minutes, or he might farm the strike for a while and whittle down that deficit still further.
Let’s see.
