Wounded Aussies show their might

We got just what we had expected. The Uppal pitch is a gorgeous batting beauty and a deadly graveyard for the bowlers. The score of 350/4 doesn’t tell you any other story, does it?

Australia, struggling to find even eleven men standing, needed a hero, and with half the game still remaining, they already have three of them. Shaun Marsh (112 from 112 balls), Shane Watson (93 from 89 balls) and Cameron White (57 from 33 balls) emerged from the shadows of Ponting and Hussey to take Australia to the highest score by any team against India in India.

Marsh and Watson provided a perfect start. They were easily taking the Indian fielders on and stealing quick singles. Marsh played a thumping pull shot off Praveen in the 5th over. Aussie openers went along nicely, hitting the ball in the gaps and rotating the strike regularly.

Fiery opening stand of 145-run between Watson and marsh puts Aus in charge. © AFP

Watson changed gears and started to tear the Indian bowling apart. In the seventh over, he hoicked Nehra over the mid-wicket fence for maximum. He didn’t spare any bowler, bludgeoning his way to a 41 ball half century. He hit Munaf Patel straight over his head for another six after scoring a boundary in the same over with a front-foot pull. He made the leg-side his own, mainly with the use of the pull and the flick shot. After starting off steadily with 56 in the first 10 overs, the Watto-Marsh pair belted 41 off the bowling powerplay.

Indian bowlers struggled to the core. Dhoni was a worried man after the 12th over yielded 14 runs and the Australian score-card read 80/0.

The pressure seemed to have got to Dhoni, when he dropped a sharp chance off Harbhajan that gave a life to Marsh. Yuvraj too, committed the heinous crime of putting Watson’s catch down off his own bowling when the dangerous batsman was on 90.

The spinners did manage to cut down the number of boundaries but wickets still eluded India. The batting, on the other hand was brilliant, as both the batsmen ran beautifully between the wickets when the boundaries were not flowing freely. The Indian ground fielding was patchy, with a superb effort following a shoddy one. The young Aussie batters superbly converted the ones into twos.

Just when Watson was looking good for his fifth ODI century, he miscued a flighted, outside the off delivery from Harbhajan to Jadeja standing at deep mid-wicket and fell seven short of the milestone. While Watson went berserk with his big shots, Marsh played a perfect anchor at the other end.

Things slowed down considerably for Australia after Watson’s departure. While Ponting and Marsh didn’t take the risks taken by Watto, the Indian spinners did a good containment job.

Shaun Marsh brings up his maiden ODI century to put Australia in the driver's seat.  © AFP

Ponting made an intelligent move by opting for the batting powerplay in the 35th over when Australia were sailing along smoothly at 192/1. The decision proved to be spot on as they annihilated the hapless Indian bowling by bludgeoning them for 44 runs in the five overs. The highlights of the powerplay was a mighty, straight hit down the ground by Marsh off Harbhajan and a glorious cover-drive by Ponting off Nehra.

Australia though lost the all important wicket of their skipper in the bargain, who was cleaned up by a Praveen Kumar beauty in the 39th over.

But one man who carried on undeterred and unfazed was Shaun Marsh. He paced his innings beautifully and brought up his maiden ODI century in 104 balls. It was a splendid performance by the young left-hander, as he collected his runs with some very good running between the wickets. His run-a-ball 112 included eight fours and two hits over the fence. India got the danger man out when he lofted a Harbhajan delivery over to Gambhir at deep square-leg, after fetching six runs off a similar shot in the previous ball.

The beauty of the Aussie innings was that the following batsman continued from where the previous one left. After Marsh’s dismissal, Cameron White took over the hitting honours and came up with a breezy, unbeaten 57 from 32 deliveries. While White played the destroyer, Hussey was his perfect accomplice with a 22 ball cameo of 31.

For India, all the bowlers with the exception of Harbhajan and Yuvraj went for more than 7.5 runs an over. The pitch was as true as it can get, the Aussie batsmen were just too hot, the Indian bowlers were not perfect with their line, there were the usual fielding fumbles and the fact that there were three dropped catches summed up the score-card at the end of the first innings- Australia 350/4!