India v Australia: second men’s one-day international match – live | Australia cricket team

11th over: India 54-5 (Kohli 23, Jadeja 4) Starc offered a sixth over as Australia look to bring their ascendancy back – and it almost works! Jadeja gets a looping leading edge for a length delivery that floats above cover. He was aiming for the midwicket. Australia then thought long and hard about a review for a leg-side catch, but only Carey seemed convinced. Starc completes the set with a vicious delivery that starts the pitch and beats the defensive push. 4-31 of this potentially winning spell.

10th over: India 51-5 (Kohli 22, Jadeja 2) Luckily India has absurd depth.

CARNAGE! Steve Smith with one of the greatest catches of all time. Abbott hits his length hard again, Hardik bats out to dry and Smith flies to his right at the second slip like a dolphin frolicking in the ocean, clutching the ball at the farthest point of his reach. Exceptional land.

9th over: India 49-4 (Kohli 22, Hardik 1) Rahul reviewed his LBW, by the way, but like Split Enz, the entire third saw from the ref was red. India’s review count has been halved.

Almost another commentator curse with Kohli cutting uncontrollably outside his stump towards Starc’s first ball of the fifth, but the thick edge lands safely behind the square. Not that the bowler had been angry for long. Three deliveries later, he has KL Rahul LBW! Classic starc, line and length, seam in the right-handed, after two that strayed. Quality fast bowling. Starc has four. Australia is naughty.

8th over: India 47-3 (Kohli 21, Rahul 9) The first bowling change of the day sees Sean Abbott replace Cameron Green. Neat start from the right arm seamer, hitting the bridge hard, just back a length. He doesn’t mind Kohli though, who steps into the 20s with disturbing ease.

7th over: India 42-3 (Kohli 18, Rahul 7) KL Rahul is out of place with a leg peek, a dangerously close shot from the Carey dive as he fell too far to the offside side at the point of contact. A few runs through the left side of the back foot are much more conventional as he resumes a proactive and tough partnership with Kohli.

6th over: India 34-3 (Kohli 17, Rahul 0) Green has settled into his job and provides an excellent foil to the Destroyer Starc. Only five points and eight point balls from his last two overs.

5th over: India 32-3 (Kohli 15, Rahul 0) KL Rahul prevents the hat-trick ball but is still a double wicket maiden for Starc. The big rapid has already justified its skipper’s decision to play first.

Do three! SKY left the first ball! It’s a Starc beauty, thundering into the crease, landing the ball on perfect line and length, finding a hint of movement right-handed and batting the bat. It looked very real-time, and after a half-way conflab, Kohli agrees and his junior partner doesn’t revise. Australia is rampant.

Starc has two! Another India giveaway with Rohit cutting to a great length delivery with flat feet, hitting an edge to Smith on the second slip who reacted superbly to the initial hit then latched on as the ball threatened to clear. Without really doing much, Australia got off to a good start.

4th over: India 32-1 (Rohit 13, Kohli 15) Three singles, three runs, one play-and-miss, no extras. The first completed regulation of the match. Green bowling at more than 140 km/h with the new ball.

3rd over: India 29-1 (Rohit 11, Kohli 14) More timing from Kohli – he came to play! Drive checked through Green’s covers is upgraded to a classic out drive from Starc. All stopwatch. The pitcher responds by sliding his length back, extracting a touch of rebound, and Kohli’s soft puff feels like a better delivery than it was. The Indian star had nothing to do to make the next legal delivery look dangerous (after another wild offside). Starc found the perfect length, a hint of wobble, and beat the outside edge and top of the stump a few inches. But again, the tracking is poor, leaking on the pads and giving Kohli another limit.

2nd over: India 19-1 (Rohit 10, Kohli 6) Cameron Green shares new ball, and he starts off with a nice full outswinger that forms nicely in the air. The rest of the over isn’t very choppy though, with Rohit doing back-to-back leg-stump half-volley boundaries per square leg, while Kohli demonstrates his timing with a checked drive for four through the covers.

On the close-up of the TV, with the bright straw-colored deck and bright green outfield, you could easily be forgiven for thinking you were in Australia. It’s only when the camera widens that you realize you’re in India. Oh, and the noise is deafening.

1st: India 8-1 (Rohit 5, Kohli 1) Not a big international cricket plus, but one that Australia will be very happy about, even if it ends with Rohit clipping a half leg volley for four.

Starc starts with a huge wide following closer to the second of two slides than the India skipper. Rohit then lands easily with a gentle guide to third with the angle of the left arm bowling in front of him from the wicket. Another wild wide, this time in the vague direction of Gill. Not sure Starc is still at the races. Lol. Next delivery, it has a counter. Of course he does. Length on the outside – really nothing delivered – and Gill floats without moving his feet and sends a thick edge straight to the point.

Mitchell Starc has the ball. Rohit Sharma is on strike. Let’s play cricket!

Both sides are in the middle. The surface appears flat and straw-colored. The lush, emerald outfield. India is in bright blue with orange accents. Australian canary yellow with hints of zinc. The referees are in magenta. It’s a beautiful scene.

Australia support the pace, India support the spin. It’s like UFC 1 when no one knew which martial artist would win. Until the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu dude shakes and annoys everyone.

Visakhapatnam is on the east coast of India where it has been raining for the past few days, but the skies cleared just in time.

This site is normally full of trails, so Steve Smith is hoping to squeeze all the surface juice from the rain of the past few days. Logic. Glenn Maxwell hurt after his first international outing for a while, hence the inclusion of Ellis.

Rohit would also have played first but is still confident there will be a later turn for his offense with three spinners.

Rohit Sharma returns as team captain, so Ishan Kishan makes way, while Axar Patel’s rotation is favored over Shardul Thakur’s growl.

India: Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, KL Rahul (wk), Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Siraj, Mohammed Shami

Alex Carey returns behind the stumps, replacing Josh Inglis, while Nathan Ellis replaces Glenn Maxwell. Still no David Warner.

Australia: Travis Head, Mitchell Marsh, Steven Smith (c), Marnus Labuschagne, Alex Carey (wk), Cameron Green, Marcus Stoinis, Sean Abbott, Mitchell Starc, Nathan Ellis, Adam Zampa

Here is Overview of Geoff’s series, if, unlike the ICC, you need context for your cricket.

The company line is that it will be useful preparation for the 50+ World Cup in India later this year. That might mean something if Australia didn’t already have a three-match date in India in September for that very purpose. The latest series has been on the schedule for a long time, the current series was announced a few months ago when it became clear that a few untapped days could be manufactured between Testing and the new Indian Premier League season. It was also around the time Cricket Australia raised ethical concerns while canceling a planned series against Afghanistan scheduled in a similar window at the end of March.

Preamble

Jonathan Howcroft

Hello everyone and welcome to the second ODI in the cricket-for-cricket’s sake series between India and Australia. Weather permitting, we will be en route to Visakhapatnam at 1:30 p.m. local time (7:00 p.m. AEDT).

Smash cut to Geoff Lemon’s introduction of the first ODI on Friday:

If you want another indication of the importance of this series, no Australian media covers it. None. All of us who did the Test series then headed for the releases. Even the cricket.com.au contingent of the internal Cricket Australia site. They’ve been to the Caribbean and Bangladesh on the team plane during the pandemic for white ball tours, but not this. Cricbuzz and Cricinfo will have their Australian correspondents in this first match in Mumbai, but only because they had other things to settle in the same city. No one will make it to the second and third matches.

For what? Because this series was only added a few months ago and serves no purpose other than filling screen time. England players were scathing about the days they played straight after the T20 World Cup last November, and half of their reserve players preferred playing Pakistan Super League T20s to appearing in Bangladesh for England matches over the past two weeks. We are at an interesting stage in the life cycle of bilateral competitions.

Friday’s series opener was far from a classic with bowlers from both sides dominating before KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja brought India home by five wickets.

Let’s see what we have in store today.

As everyone involved is meeting their contractual obligations, feel free to email me or tweet at @JPHowcroft.