In recognition of Cheteshwar Pujara’s 100th Test match, Australia’s skipper Pat Cummins gave the Indian batter an autographed Australian Test shirt on Sunday.
After Cheteshwar Pujara, an Indian hitter played in his 100th Test on Sunday, Australia skipper Pat Cummins gave him a signed Australia Test jersey. India defeated Australia by six wickets in the second Test match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy on Sunday at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Delhi. The Australians were bowled out for 113, but Rohit Sharma, Srikar Bharat, and Cheteshwar Pujara held firm. Sunday saw the BCCI upload a photo of Pujara receiving an autographed jersey from the Australian captain.
Pujara, in his 100th Test, batted as the anchor, a position he is very accustomed to, and scored 31. India reached their target in 26.4 overs thanks in large part to cameos from Shreyas Iyer (12 from 10) and Srikar Bharat (23 from 22). The game-winning runs were smashed by Pujara.
India came into the game with a 2-0 lead in the four-game series and walked away with the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. To help their side win, Pujara (31) and Bharat (23) stayed on the field till the very finish. Ravindra Jadeja took seven wickets to help India defeat Australia by a score of 42-7.
India had a tough time chasing 115, but Pujara’s unbroken 31 kept the home team safe and ultimately led to a triumph. The Indian batting lineup resumed at 14/1, and captain Rohit Sharma was on fire. He smashed the Australian bowlers all over the field, scoring 12 runs in Nathan Lyon’s over.
As Rohit was on a roll at the crease, scoring 31 runs off only 20 deliveries, he was eventually run out. Then, Cheteshwar Pujara and Virat Kohli stepped up to the plate. While Pujara was piling on the singles at regular intervals, Kohli, who was holding one end tightly, became the fastest batsman in international history to reach 25,000 runs. In an effort to relieve some of the burdens on the Indian team, the former captain kept smashing limits.
In the 16th over of the game, Virat Kohli hit a short ball from Nathan Lyon wonderfully into the backward square leg fence for a fantastic four. As a result, his team got a huge break when Todd Murphy got rid of the potentially game-ending Kohli, who had already scored 20 runs. The next man in, right-handed batsman Shreyas Iyer, hit two gorgeous sixes before being bowled by Lyon for 12 runs off 10 deliveries. Iyer’s dismissal brought Srikar Bharat, a right-handed batter, to the plate.
As Bharat started piling up the runs by smacking the Australian bowlers for boundaries, he changed gears. By the 25th over, India only needed 10 more runs to win. It was off Murphy’s bowling that Pujara, in his 100th Test, smashed a magnificent four, helping India win by six wickets in their final match against Australia.
On Sunday, the hosts were given a target of 115 runs after Australia was bowled out for 113 in their second innings at Delhi’s Ferozshah Kotla thanks to a sensational performance by spin twins Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja, including a seven-for by the latter.
When the lunch break approached, India’s total was 14/1 with Rohit Sharma (12 not out) and Cheteshwar Pujara (1 not out) at the crease. Australia’s batting restarted with the score at 61/1, with Travis Head on 39 not out and Marnus Labuschagne on 16 not out. Early in the session, Ashwin struck for the hosts by dismissing the dangerous Head for 43 runs off 46 balls, bringing Australia’s score down to 65/2. Then, Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne added 20 more runs to the innings until Ashwin sent Smith back for 9. After the end of 19 overs, Australia had scored 85 runs.
The rest of the Australian batting order was then systematically dismantled by Jadeja-Ashwin, whose deliveries were kept low and shot cleanly off the pitch. After 31.1 overs, the Australians were all out for 113 runs. Not a single player besides Head and Labuschagne scored in the double figures.
Jadeja took seven Australian wickets in twelve and a half overs, which is his finest Test bowling performance yet. Within 16 overs, Ashwin took three wickets (for 59 runs).
India’s chase of 115 collapsed after KL Rahul was dismissed for 1. This continued a rough stretch for him with the red ball. He was caught by wicketkeeper Alex Carey off the bowling of Nathan Lyon. India was 6 for 1 after 1.1 overs. Indian batsmen Rohit and Pujara made it to lunch without losing any more wickets.
