It took little more than four overs on the final day for India to wrap up a Test match they have been in control of since they won the toss on Boxing Day, with the brave efforts of Cummins and Lyon coming to and end with India winning the Test by 137 runs. In doing so they have retained the trophy they won at home 20 months ago and head to Sydney in pursuit of their first ever series victory in Australia.
The problem with sitting here and discussing the whys and wherefores of Australian cricket at this stage of the season, with India leading the four Test series 2-1, and with Australia having also been well beaten in the ODI and T20 series through November, is that none of it is a surprise and that there is nothing that has happened that anyone thought wouldn’t happen. In a year that started with a thumping Test victory over England and finished with a thumping Test defeat from India, you would be hard pressed to name any calendar year that had fallen so dramatically for Australian cricket than 2018 has. Perhaps 1977 could be seen that way, but Australia lost upwards of 25 of their best cricketers from their ranks in 1977 due to the onset of World Series Cricket. In 2018 Australia lost just three cricketers and has slipped to unforeseen depths.
There is a lot we knew way back in October, and events since that time have only confirmed them. We knew India had a better team in all forms than Australia, and that they would never have a better chance to win a Test series in Australia than on this tour. They still haven’t done that but they are so close they can taste it. They have retained the Border Gavaskar Trophy if nothing else, but given Australia’s relative weakness and India’s fine array of batting talent and amazing bowling squad they were always favourites to win this series. At least Sydney will be a live Test in that regard. We all knew that Aaron Finch doesn’t have the technique to open the batting in Test cricket. The selectors knew it, the experts knew it, even Victorian coach Andrew McDonald knew it when he wanted to bat him at five in the Shield game before the 1st Test because of it. But because Finch did a reasonable job of his debut on the lower and slower wickets in the UAE he was given the chance to make a fist of it, but he was found out immediately by the Indians bowlers. They knew his weaknesses as well as we all did, and have exploited them brilliantly. Now it is being said he must be moved down the order to either hide him or protect him, and one wonders just how you can achieve that without forcing someone else into the firing line who doesn’t want it either. We all knew that Mitch Marsh cannot command a spot in the top six in the Test team, and yet he was handed another chance just because he can bowl some overs. He failed twice with the bat trying to force the pace when a more circumspect approach was required, and his Test batting average of 25.39 SURELY now disqualifies him from being chosen again in this position. And we all knew that neither Usman Khawaja nor Shaun Marsh could substitute for Steve Smith as the rock around which our batting could revolve, but we all really hoped that one or both of them would rise to the occasion. They have both played well in patches, and both have also suffered unfortunate dismissals, but in the long run they just haven’t produced the kind of innings Australia needed if it was going to compete on an even level to Pujara and Kohli this summer.
The selectors have retained the same thirteen man squad for Sydney that they picked for Melbourne, also adding Marnus Labuschagne, who played both Tests in the UAE at number six and as part time leg spinner. With the Sydney wicket expected to turn and he being the only extra spinner in the squad it appears almost certain that he will get a run and probably at the expense of Mitch Marsh. The only other change could be the inclusion of Peter Handscomb at the expense of Aaron Finch which would require a juggling of the batting order. All of those permutations will just give me a headache to run through, and for all intents and purposes would be like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The selectors in their wisdom have left the fate of this particular series in the hands of those that have got them to this point. Perhaps after Sydney is when we will see some real change if the result is not in Australia’s favour.
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