History against India as test series moves to Sydney
Can India overcome their poor record in the second match of back-to-back tests with a short turnaround to force a draw and retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy?
IMAGE: Yashasvi Jaiswal has a chat with the umpires after being dismissed (Associated Press).
The 2024/25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy between India and Australia has been a seesawing affair, as indicated by the final day of the Boxing Day Test earlier this week.
There was much discussion as to whether the Aussies had left themselves enough time to bowl the Indians out after Scott Boland and Nathan Lyon batted until the end of day four and then came out to bat again at the start of day five.
While it’s not exactly clear what captain Pat Cummins and the rest of the coaching staff were thinking, I doubt whether they would have been overly pleased by Australia’s number 10 and 11 lasting an additional 10 deliveries – for only six runs – before Lyon was bowled by Jasprit Bumrah.
At the change of innings India required 340 to win and Australia needed to take 10 wickets in the 92 overs of play that remained. Yashasvi Jaiswal and Rohit Sharma saw off the first 16 overs before Cummins removed the Indian skipper (nine off 40) and KL Rahul (0 from 5) in the space of six balls. Ten overs later Mitchell Starc had Virat Kohli caught at first slip, leaving the Indians 3/33 at the lunch break.
Jaiswal and Rishab Pant survived the whole second session, adding 79 runs. Pant was dismissed shortly after the tea break (30 off 104), skying a short delivery from Travis Head to Mitch Marsh at long on.
There was still hope for Team India, with Jaiswal joined by the experienced Ravindra Jadeja (two from 14) and first innings century-maker Nitish Kumar Reddy (one off 5) – although that hope seemed to fade after the latter two were dismissed in quick succession.
When Jaiswal was (somewhat controversially) dismissed seven overs later (a valiant 84 off 208) it seemed like it would only be a matter of time before the home team claimed victory. The test wrapped up nine overs after Jaiswal was caught behind, with Lyon trapping Mohammed Siraj lbw.
The teams have had just three days off, with the fifth and final test kicking off later this morning at the SCG.
This will be the second time this series where there has been (or should have been) such a short turnaround between matches – had the second test in Adelaide lasted the full five days then there would only have been three rest days before the third test in Brisbane started.
This fixturing quirk got me wondering about if there had been such rapid turnarounds in other series between these two teams, and whether there was an association between the result of the first match and the second.
Australia and India have played in 111 tests. Australia have won 47 to India’s 33, with 30 draws and one tie. There have been 41 instances where tests have been played with five or less days off between matches.
History suggests India will have a tough time winning the final test, drawing the series 2-2 and retaining the Border-Gavaskar Trophy – they have won just three of 19 tests off a short break when Australia won the previous test.
The Aussies have performed slightly better in this situation, winning seven of the second tests, with the remaining nine resulting in a draw.
Result of the second match in back-to-back tests (5 or fewer days off between matches) between Australia and India based on the outcome of the first match
The timeframe of this stat is limited based on what data are freely/easily available and/or accessible. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you spot any errors in what I have presented.