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Follow UsAustralia scored 260, New Zealand scored 259.
India were bowled out for 105 then and 156 now.
Steve O’Keefe was the pick of Australian bowlers with 6/35, and Mitchell Santner was the pick of New Zealand bowlers with 7/53.
The eerie resemblance with the 2017 Pune Test can’t be ignored.
"This batting performance from India is worse than 46 if I look at conditions and shot selection," Ian Smith did not mince a single word.
Walking into this Test, even in your wildest dreams, you wouldn’t have expected Santner to be blowing this strong Indian batting unit away. The left-arm spinner, time and again, underperformed to a level where it irked the cricket fans.
Santner had a bowling average of 42.20. That’s already quite bad, but then when you look at how he has done in Asia, a strike rate of 100.5, it might pain your eyes. He wasn’t bad, he was just dreadful.
There weren’t too many bowlers who were this bad on a more consistent basis.
But here’s the thing: you know what’s the worst thing about a narrative?
It only lasts till it lasts.
One such narrative is Santner’s Test form. The left-arm spinner should have been the last of all spinners to have troubled India, but that’s how it panned out in the second Test in Pune. Every over that he bowled, you could see how threatening he was getting, with the drift, the bounce and definitely, the turn.
Prior to this, Santner had never picked up a four-wicket haul in Tests, let alone a five-wicket haul. But to take seven wickets in a single innings against India away from home requires more than just luck. In Santner’s case, it required the guile, a spectacular arm-ball and variations in pace.
Santner was always about consistency, but in Pune, his variations were more about the pace at which he operated. Unlike his modus operandi, where the deliveries are flatter, pacier, and with the arm, the 32-year-old operated at an average speed of 86, getting the ball to turn off the surface. But amidst that, he also sneaked in a few rapid deliveries, shocking the batters with the pace.
The left-arm spinner started the innings operating in the 80s and touching 90 kmph, immediately troubling Shubman Gill late on the first day’s play. In his first over of the second day, Santner bowled with guile, first beating Gill’s outside edge before beating his inside edge, trapping him right in front, only for the umpire’s call to save him.
It could have been a wicket any other day but not on the day. Consistently through his spell, the left-arm spinner kept troubling Gill before he ultimately beat him on the inside with an arm ball, bowling at 91.2 kmph.
However, that mode of operation changed the very next few overs when he flighted the ball, beating Virat Kohli’s ugly hoick. It was the change of pace that perhaps caught the former Indian skipper off guard, with Santner bowling it at 82.6 kmph, far lower than the speed that he regularly operates at.
Understanding the conditions and the batter arguably made the 32-year-old almost a different beast in Pune. Sarfaraz Khan is quite a simple batter, bowl anything in his length, and he will readily sweep you to smithereens.
That understanding ultimately helped Santner get the better of Sarfaraz. He slowed the pace down to 78 kmph and made the right-hander play a shot early, straight into the hands of Will ORourke, who was stationed in a slightly deep mid-off position specifically for that shot. If you were wondering what he did differently, it was a sum of all of this.
Against Ashwin, it was the pitch working its magic, with a quick (90.5 kmph) delivery that caught the Indian all-rounder on the back foot, accounting for the easiest of LBW dismissals. While Santner was unlucky early up against Jadeja, where the Blackcaps didn’t review for a caught dismissal.
Jadeja threatened them, but that’s where, yet again, the street smarts of Santner were on display. The left-arm spinner realised the assignment, and kept ripping the ball as quickly as possible, imparting a lot of revs, which was what resulted in Jadeja’s dismissal. While it did hit the crack, and it did help his case, it was a clever setup from the left-arm spinner, thanks to the pace.
Once the damage was done, the rest was just history ready for the making, as Santner finished with figures of 7/53, the third-best figures for any New Zealand spinner in India. 19 wickets out of a possible 20 fell to spin, and Santner accounted for seven of them.
Of course, a five-wicket haul for Santner wasn’t on your bingo list.
There’s a very good reason for that. Prior to this clash, he had bowled 862.3 overs without a five-wicket haul. What a day to change the record.
Narratives change; all it requires is time, and in the New Zealand all-rounder's case, time, guile, and skills were all paid actors behind his success.
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