Ahmedabad, March 10 India openers Shubman Gill and Rohit Sharma saw off the tricky 10 overs with relative ease to be unbeaten on 18 and 17 respectively as the hosts were 36/0, trailing Australia by 444 runs at stumps on second day of the fourth Test, here on Friday.
With the pitch still in favour of stroke play at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Rohit was pristine in his timing, flicking and cutting off Mitchell Starc and Nathan Lyon with relative ease. On the other hand, Gill sweetly played a short-arm jab on a short ball from Cameron Green, before dancing down the pitch to smash a six off Lyon at the stroke of stumps.
Earlier, ace India off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin picked a six-wicket haul (6/91) in a magical display of skill and control to bowl out Australia for 480. With pitch not showing much signs of sharp turn, Ashwin single-handedly got India back in the match.
After picking three wickets in the second session, Ashwin took three more to get his six-fer and wrap Australia's innings at 167.2 overs. For the visitors, posting a big total on a nice batting pitch was possible thanks to left-handed opener Usman Khawaja's marathon 180, and Cameron Green smashing his first Test century through an entertaining 114, apart from Nathan Lyon and Todd Murphy sharing a 70-run stand for the ninth wicket.
The final session began with instant success for India as Usman Khawaja missed a straighter ball from Axar Patel and was struck plumb in front of stumps. With the pitch still being good to bat, Lyon and Murphy were able to get ten boundaries collectively off Axar, Ravichandran Ashwin and Mohammed Shami.
Ashwin finally gave India success when he beat Murphy on the inside edge with an arm ball to trap him lbw and in his next over, the ace off-spinner drew an outside edge off Lyon, which was caught by slip after ricocheting off the wicketkeeper's pad, ending Australia's innings at 167.2 overs.
Brief Scores: Australia 480 in 167.2 overs (Usman Khawaja 180, Cameron Green 114; Ravichandran Ashwin 6/91, Mohammed Shami 2/134) lead India 36/0 in 10 overs (Shubman Gill 18 not out, Rohit Sharma 17 not out) by 444 runs.
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