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Australia legend Ian Healy launched a scathing attack on India following a pathetic act at Nagpur's Vidarbha Cricket Association (VCA) Stadium.
After the Pat Cummins-led side lost the first Test of the Border Gavaskar Trophy in Maharashtra by an innings and 132 runs, the Australian cricket team decided to spend some time in the nets at the VCA ground but were not able to do so as the curators denied him access to the practice wickets.
According to Ian Healy, the Australian coaching staff informed the curators about their plans to train at the facility. But they couldn't practice there as the pitches were watered despite the visitors' request to access the wickets.
“It's really embarrassing the scuppering of our plans to get some practice sessions on that Nagpur wicket,” Ian Healy said. “That's not good, that's just not good for cricket. The ICC needs to step in here. For them to water the wicket unceremoniously when it was requested for practice is horrible and that has to improve.”
News Corp’s Robert Craddock declared it was “blatant pitch doctoring”.
“When the Gabba pitch had too much grass left on it, people were saying, ‘Yes it was not a great wicket, but it was the same for everyone’.
“But you can’t say that about this pitch, Australia has six left-handers in their top eight, so if you start multi-preparing parts of the deck that’s straight-up pitch doctoring, it’s poor.”
Earlier, Australia coach Andrew McDonald said that he had planned the practice session for his team to get acclimatized to the extremely spin-friendly wickets in India.
“It’s pretty clear isn’t it, their intent with the surfaces they want to play on. We were expecting that coming in so as I said before, we’ve been really clear on what we expected,” he said.
“When we got here we got exactly that. They’re not naughty boy nets today (the planned session). We’ve got a big squad of 17 players so there’s different people on different training programs. There’ll be a couple of players from the game that will come down, so they’ll be seen at training. But it’s certainly not naughty boy nets, it’s just preparing for the next game.”
Even before Australia landed in India, pitches in the South Asian country have been under intense scrutiny, with Ian Healy labeling them “unfair” to the visitors, considering the home team always wanted to play on dust bowls that turn square from Day 1.
“They (India) have got a good team but I’m not too scared of their spinners unless they produce unreasonable wickets. If they produce unreasonable wickets like they did half the series last time (we won’t win), two wickets were just terrible, unfair, spinners jumping over your head on day one,” Ian Healy told SEN Network.
“So that type of thing they will play better on than we will, but if they get flat wickets that India used to put out, nice flat batting wickets and bowlers have to work really hard, I think we can do it. But (my prediction is) 2-1 India, if (Mitchell) Starc is unavailable in the first Test,” Ian Healy added.
However, with India registering a comprehensive victory over the Australians in Nagpur, the supporters of the Rohit Sharma-led team took to Twitter to blast Pat Cummins and his men for making excuses even before the commencement of the match.
From start to finish, the Indians dominated the clash, with Ravindra Jadeja, Rohit Sharma, and Ravichandran Ashwin starring in their emphatic win.
After Australia won the toss and opted to bat first, nothing went right for them. Making a spectacular comeback to action after a five-month injury-induced layoff, Jadeja picked a five-wicket haul to bowl out the visitors for 177.
In reply, India made 400 runs in their first innings, courtesy of Rohit Sharma's splendid ninth Test hundred and scores 70 and 84 from Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel. With this, Team India took a mammoth 223-run lead over Australia, and the Kangaroos needed to put in at least 224 runs in their second essay to ensure the hosts batted again.
But Ravichandran Ashwin had other ideas as he ran through the Australian top order, sending five of their batters back into the pavilion to accomplish his 32nd fifer in Tests.
With it, he went past Australian legend Shane Warne and his former national colleague Harbhajan Singh’s tally of five-wicket hauls in Test cricket.
Ravichandran Ashwin was lethal on a Day 3 pitch that aided sharp turn and offered indifferent bounce. He was the one who started the collapse of the Australian batting line-up, dismissing their opener Usman Khawaja in his first over.
Afterward, Ravichandran Ashwin picked up the wickets of David Warner, Matt Renshaw, Peter Handscomb, and Alex Carrey to leave Australia tottering at 6/64.
Subsequently, the Australians were bowled out for 91, losing the match by a massive margin, handing India a 1-0 lead in the four-game Test series.
The second Test between the two sides begins in Delhi on February 17.
