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India can save the Test

India can save this Test. They needed a quality performance or assistance from the weather to be in a position do that after four days and received both to some degree, most notably the former. India may still have an opportunity to win it, actually, as day five should consist of 105 overs with a further 335 runs required and nine wickets in hand – not an impossible task, when Sachin Tendulkar is yet to bat.

The Indian bowlers gave a good account of themselves even if the over rate left a lot to be desired in what was a building phase of the match for a majority of the day. When the team batting first has claimed a sizeable first innings lead, the third innings is usually a matter of seeing how quickly that team can score before declaring. The real action tends to arrive after the declaration is made and the final innings begins with the batting team endeavouring to save the match and wickets at a premium.

So it was here, with India having to negotiate 21 overs and for the first time in the series making a fairly solid start. No matter how many wickets the opening bowlers took, everyone would still have wanted to see Brett Lee in action and if the Indian top order couldn’t stand up to him they may as well have kissed their chances goodbye. Lee harassed Dravid and Ramesh but they came away unscathed at the end of it, bruises notwithstanding.

Tendulkar has been protected from the new ball for the first time and this might turn out to be very important. When the Indian captain batted in Adelaide and in the first innings of this Test, he was encumbered with the responsibility of stemming a collapse and had to play stoically to keep his side in the contest. He is yet to bat with India in a dominant position in which he can give free rein to instincts and play the kind of superlative innings he is capable of. The situation thus far has demanded otherwise and could do so again on the fifth day, but the key difference is India has made a respectable start to its innings. The first goal is obviously for the overnight not outs to bat until lunch and if they can go close to achieving that, India has an opportunity to press for an unlikely win because the pitch remains true due to the rain and Tendulkar would have a platform from which he could launch a match-winning innings.

That would be the hope, but if the scenario doesn’t eventuate, the match can still be saved. Brett Lee and co. will have something to say about that, however, as the Australians are gunning for their 6th successive victory to establish a piece of history they are desperate to attain.

The shaky top order looked like it might crumble again when Laxman fell and both teams, especially India, must be concerned over the lack of productivity from the opening combination. After a bumper series against Pakistan, Blewett and Slater have realised a highest partnership of 8 from four innings against India and the tourists have fared little better, with their best being 11. Laxman might make a decent opener in Indian conditions but in Australia he has been a sacrificial lamb and with scores of 5 and 1 in Melbourne, India has gained nothing from dropping Gandhi.

Fleming removed Laxman with a surprise bouncer of pinpoint accuracy, which he had to hook to avoid being struck on the head. Ramesh had an air of vulnerability about him early and Dravid was tentative once more, but they improved as the overs went by in the face of some hostile bowling.

Lee, again sending down 150kmp/h thunderbolts when he warmed up, hit Ramesh a few times but he weathered it – barely. Ramesh made the worst possible start to his innings by taking two right-hand gloves out to the middle and played the kind of airy shots that made it look like an edge was a matter of time, but he now has the opportunity to turn his series around.

Once the Indian first innings was quickly wrapped up, Srinath and Agarkar gave the Australian openers a torrid working over. The pair make an excellent new-ball combination with their penetrating seam and swing bowling which the Australians have found hard to combat. Later in an innings, though, those same bowlers have been found wanting when the seam movement subsides and at times have looked ordinary. But with the new ball nipping around, they are productive.

Agarkar dislodged Slater after another non-existent opening partnership, trapping him plumb lbw when he shouldered arms to a ball that seamed in instead of continuing to swing away. Srinath jagged the ball both ways alarmingly and Blewett had great difficulty laying bat on him. Blewett took 29 balls to get off the mark in a scratchy innings, and although he is batting like a man struggling desperately for form, his new-found ability to scrap through must be some consolation.

With rain limiting the first session to 11 overs, the match had a feel of a draw about it as Srinath and Agarkar showed no sign of relenting. This tour could be the making of Agarkar as a Test player for he has been lively even when bowling poorly and generally seemed a bowler who is likely to take a wicket. At first he glance he would not appear the kind of bowler to discomfort the Australian batsmen, but they are troubled more by lateral movement than pace and he has the swing to complement it.

Agarkar removed Langer with a good bouncer, a delivery he and Fleming both bowl surprisingly fast, that rushed onto the batsmen and clipped the glove on the way to the keeper as Langer attempted to hook. Australia declared its intentions by promoting Gilchrist to No. 4, as did India by placing two men deep for the hook shot. Prasad eventually replaced Srinath, whose spell was almost as good as Agarkar’s, especially with the ball at its newest.

If Mark Waugh had come out to join Blewett it might have made for painful viewing, but with Gilchrist in Australia could pick up the tempo. Gilchrist is in such form that everything he does is forceful and full of purpose and he looks to score from every ball without resorting to unorthodoxy. That makes him a dangerous player for the opposition, the sort that seems to be on 20 runs without having worked for it. Gilchrist is the only Australian batsman to look like taking more than singles off Kumble, and he was quick to dispatch the deliveries pitched short to a vacant mid wicket.

In an incident worth relating from the middle session, India thought it had Blewett caught behind off Prasad when bat brushed pad. In one of India’s running, celebratory-style appeals, Mannava Prasad got carried away and ran into Ganguly, falling down and injuring his ankle. If you wanted to he harsh, you could say it was instant karma for that inappropriate form of appealing. Blewett had no idea what happened so asked Gilchrist, who mimicked Prasad’s accident to the amusement of his partner.

Blewett’s laborious knock was brought to an end by a clever piece of bowling by Kumble, taking his first wicket of the match. Kumble drifted one to leg and Blewett played that way, closing the face of the bat as the ball turned fractionally to take an edge to slip. Kumble also picked up Gilchrist just as he was launching what would have been an entertaining assault, caught at long on.

Agarkar came back and earnt the wicket of Steve Waugh, for the third time, while Mark Waugh relieved some more of the pressure on himself with an unbeaten half-century, after which the captain made a positive declaration, setting India 376 to keep them in with a possibility of winning.

Daniel Laidlaw