Twitter Reactions: Ravindra Jadeja underbowled by Virat Kohli, still bags 6/63

After managing only 189 in their 1st essay, India managed to crawl their way back in the 2nd Test in Bengaluru after bowling out the Australians pretty cheaply on the 3rd day morning. Beginning at the overnight score of 237/6, Australia lost all their remaining four wickets in an hours time, securing a first innings lead of 87. Ravindra Jadeja was the pick of the Indian bowlers who finished with figures of 6/63 in 22 overs.

On the 2nd day too, Jadeja bagged three wickets and troubled the Aussie batsmen on a consistent basis. Despite Jadeja getting purchase from the wicket, Kohli under bowled him throughout the innings and relied more on his primary spinner Ravichandran Ashwin and his two pacers Ishant Sharma and Umesh Yadav. It was definitely unjust given the left-arm tweaker bowled terrific lines and never allowed the rival batsmen to settle down.

While Ashwin bowled 49 overs, Jadeja was given only 22 overs where he finished with a 6 wicket haul. If India does manage to post a good 2nd innings total, then Kohli will definitely use him more in the 2nd innings and might be the trump card for the hosts even in the 2nd innings. India will be looking to wipe of Australia’s 87 runs lead and set the visitors a competitive 4th innings target. Anything more than 200 will be difficult for the Aussies to chase down especially in spin-friendly conditions at the Chinnaswamy Stadium.

Jadeja began with the wicket of Aussie captain Steve Smith early and followed it up with wickets of Matt Renshaw and Peter Handscomb yesterday. Smith inside edged a full-length delivery onto his pads and Wriddhiman Saha completed a very good catch. Youngster Matt Renshaw was set up beautifully by Jadeja and was stumped by Saha while Peter Handscomb was caught at mid wicket quite brilliantly by Ravichandran Ashwin after juggling on his first attempt.

Also read: Australia has got inside Virat’s head: Matthew Hayden

Jadeja opened his tally today with the wicket of Matthew Wade. He trapped him in front bowling from around the wicket and there was no hesitation in the umpire’s mind in ruling it in favour of the home team. He was on a hat-trick after dismissing Nathan Lyon in the very next delivery but couldn’t quite achieve the feat. He finished off the Aussie innings with the wicket of Josh Hazlewood with Australia’s score at 276