Melbourne: Abhishek Sharma stood tall amid ruins with a combative 37-ball-68 as Australian pacers, led by Josh Hazlewood, dismantled the Indian top-order to bowl out the visitors for a paltry 125 in the second T20 International, here Friday.
Abhishek played some outrageous shots on the off-side: slashes, check drives and lofted strokes, to race to a 23-ball half-century in his maiden appearance at the iconic venue while others made a beeline towards the dugout.
The innings folded with eight balls still to be consumed.
His knock comprised of eight fours and two sixes. His stand of 56 runs with Harshit Rana, (35 off 33 balls) promoted to No.7, allowed India to cross 100-run mark. As many as nine batters could not reach double digits.
What worked for Abhishek was his ability to use the crease and ride the bounce at the same time but in the back-10, he was left frustrated with the lower middle-order batters who could not rotate the strike.
He didn’t get strike for close to five overs as Rana faced bulk of the deliveries and later the likes of Shivam Dube and Kuldeep Yadav also consumed many balls.
At 110 for 8, Abhishek took it upon himself as he hooked Xavier Bartlett for a six and prior to that a boundary as the total reached 125.
In front of a capacity MCG crowd, Indian skipper Suryakumar Yadav lost the toss and Hazlewood (3/13) got into the act even as there was a splendid defiance by the in-form Abhishek at one end. Hazlewood bowled an incredible 15 dot balls in his four-over spell.
Hazlewood, immaculate as ever, bowled the Test match length consistently in the 6-8m region, getting just the right amount of movement that had the top order in a tangle.
He softened Shubman Gill (5) with a well-directed bouncer that needed a mandatory concussion test after the batter survived a leg-before appeal to a fuller incoming delivery first up.
When Hazlewood bowled a fullish length outside off-stump, the Indian vice-captain’s chip shot to clear the mid-off fielder didn’t yield result as Mitchell Marsh grabbed an easy catch.
Before Gill would have cooled his heels, Nathan Ellis’ nip-backer found Sanju Samson (2) plumb in-front and he wasted a DRS review, aware that he won’t survive.
Hazlewood then bowled what would easily be the ball of the game. He first bowled a short ball that skipper Surya had gloved trying to pull but Josh Inglis grassed it on second attempt.
The next delivery was a pitched up that saw the Indian skipper develop cold feet. There was no feet movement and the body squared up and the shade outward movement kissed the outside edge of his bat before falling into the keeper’s gloves.
Two balls later, Tilak Varma (0) edge one from Hazlewood. The ball ballooned up for Inglis to complete formalities.
Once Axar was run out, Harshit and Abhishek steadied the innings but the former played and missed often to put more pressure on the latter.
