India v Australia: Robert Craddock reviews Australia’s first Test defeat

How does Australia pick up the pieces after its lowest Test total ever in India? Robert Craddock analyses the dire fallout from the Nagpur nightmare.

Australian cricket is in a state of numbness over the massacre of Nagpur but the most chastening fact is there is no obvious way to mop up the mess and regroup.

The path forward has many searing questions and few obvious answers.

The axing of Travis Head looked silly on day one and positive stupid on day three after Australia’s dreadful performance.

He must return. But Travis Head alone would not have raised the Titanic.

The Aussies were skittled for 91 in the second innings. Picture: Getty Images

Wily finger spinner Ravi Ashwin mesmerised the Australians, mixing balls that spin with balls that don’t so obviously Australia must find a way to prepare for him.

But here’s the chastening news. They thought they had.

Remember the Ashwin impersonator who was wheeled into the nets before the first Test.

He was supposed to help the Australians pick the subtle nuances of Ashwin’s variation balls and prepare them for the deadly straight ball which so often snares leg before wicket decisions which were an ugly feature of Australia’s second innings.

But in Nagpur on Saturday they found Ashwin harder to read than a Chinese crossword. Even trying to nothing more than block him down the pitch was an overwhelming challenge.

Ravichandran Ashwin raises the ball after taking five wickets. Picture: AFP

Cameron Green’s possible return may help Australia but it’s not as if he’s going to make Australia’s wobbly top-order suddenly feel comfortable about reading India’s mesmerising slow men.

It is a matter of increased concern that it’s not as if Australia went down slogging and need to drop back a gear – all they were trying to do was defend their stumps and they couldn’t do that.

As if it was ever in doubt, India know precisely what they want in the last three Tests – dry, turning decks. If they get them they almost certainly have to win.

This is a team which has lost one of its last 27 home series.

Australia has batting issues all the way down the order with openers Usman Khawaja and David Warner both failing twice in the game.

They have been wonderful warriors for Australia but pressure rises quickly on Indian tours and they must immediately respond to this challenge.

Mohammed Shami celebrates taking the wicket of Scott Boland of Australia to give India victory. Picture: Getty Images

India were excellent but even Allan Border, who knows what it is like to be caught in a King Tide of Indian momentum, said it was an “embarrassing’’ effort from Australia.

Old-fashioned tough nut Border also called for a harder edge and the sight of Australian batsmen giving Indian bowlers a thumbs up for beating them outside off stump was far too soft for his liking.

He called it “ridiculous.’’

Head will probably replace either Matt Renshaw, who had a horror game, or Peter Handscomb.

It doesn’t really matter who. But he must play.

One harsh reality Australia will confront is it lacks the one bowler it needs to win a Test there – a left-arm spinner.

With Ashton Agar’s confidence at bootlace level, he almost certainly won’t be chosen for a Test on this tour.

That’s a concern because India’s three slow men – Ravi Ashwin, Ravi Jadeja and Axar Patel are not only outstanding spinners – but they bat extremely well.

Todd Murphy put in a brilliant performance on debut, but captain Pat Cummins has plenty of work to do to mount a challenge in the series. Picture: AFP

Exceptional though he is, Todd Murphy cannot be expected to carry the world on his young shoulders.

Australian captain Pat Cummins faces the greatest challenge in cricket to raise the Titanic from the bottom of the harbour.

He has been admirably cool but he must be chastened.

He admitted recently that this tour could define a generation of Australian cricketers. A Mt Everest climb awaits him to turn the tide.

CRASH: WHY JADEJA ACTIONS WERE ALWAYS GOING VIRAL

The “sticky fingers’’ affair on the first day of the Nagpur Test shows how much the world has changed since Sandpapergate.

Place your fingers anywhere near a foreign substance and go near a cricket ball and you can expect to be global news.

Fidgety bowlers beware. The world is watching your every move.

Indian team management have told match referee Andy Pycroft that Ravindra Jadeja was applying pain-relief cream to the index finger of his bowling hand and not trying to tamper with the cricket ball after mysteriously taking the substance off the back of Mohammed Siraj’s hand with his non-bowling hand.

Indian official says spinner Ravindra Jadeja received some cream for a finger injury.

But the vision didn’t look good in isolation and social media lit up soon after.

The vision looks suspect and it was right for the match referee to investigate.

But — unlike the pitch doctoring scandal where the truth of the matter looked blindingly obvious — the facts are murky and it’s hard to know what really happened.

Jadeja probably deserves to get the benefit of the doubt for a few different reasons including the fact that he does not appear to attempt to rub the ball with the foreign substance he has claimed is a pain relief cream.

Also, India have a bowling attack which is spin-based and it is not worth their while to “treat’’ the ball as fieldsmen used to get reverse swing for fast bowlers.

Spinners generally want to be able to grip a cricket ball, not have it slip through their fingers because it’s got cream on it.

Ravindra Jadeja took a scintillating 5-47 and was the difference between the two teams in a superb return to Test cricket in Nagpur.

At one point when India were fielding a substitute fieldsman ran on with a small package which may have been the cream and he tossed it to a fieldsman from five metres away — not the sort of thing you would do if you were hiding anything.

That said, Michael Clarke made a solid point when he said if you are going to apply a cream — which would be understandable given he has barely bowled for six months — to a damaged finger it should be done in the presence of the umpire.

Or do it when you are not holding the cricket ball.

The rules of cricket state you are not allowed to put a foreign substance on the ball.

Bowlers beware. The world is watching.

Cricket’s modern day dilemma: Is fitness or talent worth more?

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Once upon a time, cricket was seen as a universal game. Not just in its appeal to a global audience but for the fact that individuals of any shape, size, colour, creed or class could play alongside each other.

With the news that Dane van Niekerk, one of the best players in the women’s game, has been left out of South Africa’s Twenty20 World Cup squad on fitness grounds alone, this age-old perception may just have landed in the trash can.

Less athletic players, it seems, are now being penalised, no matter how good they are at actually playing cricket. And yet some of the greatest players would have struggled to pass fitness tests, certainly in their older years.

WG Grace, who used to “block shooters to the boundary” in the 19th century, may have started his career as a lithe athlete but had little time for the sharp single as his waistline expanded in his thirties and forties.

Dane van Niekerk while playing for the Adelaide Strikers. Picture: Getty Images

Warwick Armstrong, one of Australia’s greatest captains in the early part of the 20th century, was known as the “Big Ship” because of his 130kg frame and billowing shirt.

Van Niekerk, 29, is a leg-spinning all-rounder and the only South African woman to have scored more than 1,500 runs and taken more than 50 wickets in women’s T20 internationals.

From 2016 to 2021 she captained the side in all three formats. However, she last played for the national team in September 2021 and has been recovering from a broken ankle.

Her exclusion from the World Cup squad was because she did not achieve the required time for a two-kilometre run.

Having lost 10kg since playing in England last summer and in spite of running a personal best, she missed the nine minute 30 seconds limit by 18 seconds which, according to team officials, was not good enough.

“Dane was given an extensive opportunity to meet the minimum criteria, or the fitness benchmark for eligibility into the World Cup,” said women’s selection convener Clinton du Preez.

“It’s purely based on the not meeting of the fitness criteria that she’s missed out.”

Van Niekerk said she was “broken” by the decision to exclude her from the World Cup which starts on her home patch on February 10, but the decision may backfire on the South Africans who now go into the tournament without two, maybe even three, of their best players.

Last year, another key player Lizelle Lee was left out of the tour to England and Ireland for failing to meet her weight requirement. She subsequently retired from international cricket in order to play in the franchises.

And, although she was named in the World Cup squad, there must be some doubt as to whether Marizanne Kapp will walk away in protest. She is married to Van Niekerk and pulled out of Thursday’s T20 against India for “personal” reasons.

Van Niekerk’s exclusion is a big talking point. Picture: AAP

South Africa is not the only country to have fitness tests but they do appear one of the more rigid.

Sisanda Magala, who played in the recent men’s ODI series against England, was excluded from the squad last year after similarly failing to meet the target, in his case by 12 seconds.

The Van Niekerk decision highlights, however, a trend in cricket which is seeing a squeeze on athletes who are built more for comfort than speed.

The rise of short-form cricket is certainly a factor as the fielding skills are now far advanced of what they were even 10 years ago.

The natural power advantage that bigger players such as Colin Milburn or the “short and stocky” New Zealand wicketkeeper Jock Edwards may have had in the past is less vital now that bats have become sledgehammer and boundaries have been shortened.

What future then for the likes of West Indies off-spinner Rahkeem Cornwall, listed on his Wiki page as weighing in at 140 kilos, or the Pakistani batsman Azam Khan who is still mocked, as seen on Twitter this week as he walked out to bat in the Bangladesh Premier League, even after losing 30 kilos?

“It’s not about being overweight, it’s about performance,” said Azam, making the case for the defence in an article in January’s Cricket Monthly.

“If a guy is scoring 400 runs and he is super-fit and another guy is scoring 800 runs and he is not super-fit, I will keep the guy who scored 800 runs in my team. That’s my point of view.”

Originally published as India v Australia: Robert Craddock reviews Australia’s first Test defeat