WTC day one: India blow big opportunity
LIV and let die: Saudis continue to feast on sporting souls
It’s every cricket captain’s dream to get to the final, call the flip of the coin correctly and insert the opposition on a green-top under leaden skies.
It’s every cricket captain’s nightmare for your four-man pace attack to turn that massive advantage into a calamitous mistake.
That was Rohit Sharma’s lot overnight as the perfect scenario became the perfect storm.
After a probing first hour where India took one wicket - Usman Khawaja for a duck - and could have and probably should have had at least one more, the attack wilted.
While they managed to strangle David Warner (43) and beat Marnus Labuschagne (26) with a genuinely great Mohammad Shami delivery, they otherwise looked powerless.
Australia finished the day at 327-3, with Travis Head on an imperious 146 and Steve Smith a rock-solid 95. The crazy thing was that the final five overs, bowled with a second new Duke’s ball, showed there was still plenty of life left in this Oval wicket.
After watching New Zealand turn around a ridiculous position after England earlier this year it would be foolish to call the World Test Championship final already, but after one day of five (six if time is lost to weather) it is close to impossible to conceive of anything but an Australia victory.
How India must now regret leaving Ravichandran Ashwin’s 474 wickets on the sidelines in favour of the extra seamer. Umesh Yadav and Shardul Thakur were both as poor as Head and Smith were brilliant.
In an Ashes preview, Andrew McGlashan wrote that before Bazball there was Travball.
He must be feeling pretty clever about that now. The South Australian notched his sixth test century and his first away from Australia. When he scores runs he does so quickly, as this Cricinfo graphic demonstrates.
The Ashes can’t come quickly enough. This WTC was meant to be the end of something but unless India can find something sadly missing on day one, it might serve only as an appetiser to the main course.