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Follow UsDay 2 of the Perth Test progressed at a pace that reminded me of the next day after my convocation in college when everyone and everything was in a slow hangover after a full day of partying.
After 17 wickets fell like dominoes on Day 1, two wicketless sessions on the next day make you think that someone has replaced the pitch right after Nathan Lyon’s wicket fell in the morning. Mitch Starc and Josh Hazlewood batted more balls for the 10th wicket than the entire top five of Australia combined. Yashasvi Jaiswal even shouted back to Starc in jest while batting, saying, “It’s coming too slow.”
Once the day’s play ended, it became even clearer that even Australian bowlers didn’t do anything much different on day 2. That’s why you can see such similarity in the lengths where they have attacked the Indian batters over the last two days, but with contrasting results.
So what happened? Did the pitch sleep? Was it that KL Rahul and Jaiswal were actually superb batters who batted as if their life depended on it?
As is the case with most things in Test cricket, you only get the full picture once you combine both of these reasons.
Andrew McDonald, Australia's coach, didn’t hold himself back in the press conference when he said that the “surface looked considerably drier…it dried out quickly”. He was pretty true in his assessment because the contrast in the look of the pitch on the two days makes you want to think that a herd of goats grazed through all the grass overnight. The frequency of big seam movement, which was available in plenty on Day 1, had considerably reduced, although it was still a Perth pitch. Hence, it did seam and bounce.
That’s where the Indian batters also responded in a manner that made everyone watching sit and question if it was the same Indian team that folded for 150 in the first innings. And here, the openers alone scored 172/0, the highest second-innings opening partnership for an Indian opening pair in Australia ever!
Jaiswal was dismissed in the first innings after playing an on-the-up, away-from-the-body drive that would have earned him a boundary eight out of ten times in Rajkot. However, you have a look at him the next day, and you’d know that adapting to a new, challenging situation isn’t a big deal for someone like him, who left Bhadohi as a kid and made a life for himself in Mumbai.
His weakness against left-arm pacers who swung/seamed the ball from him was evident in the first innings. It followed a similar pattern from South Africa, where Nandre Burger had troubled him with his rising deliveries that seamed away after coming in. Starc and Australia had clearly done their homework, as Yashasvi was peppered with such deliveries from the left-arm pacer.
Not only that, in his short career, the over-the-wicket angle from right-arm pacers had also troubled Jaiswal. The deliveries that went across him and passed near the fourth stump were hard for him to leave as well, as he’s someone who loves to cut and drive on the backfoot.
So what does the 22-year-old do? Does the flamboyant youngster still have the resolve to channel the doggedness that he showed in his Test debut century in the West Indies?
Well, this change wouldn't have felt that hard for someone who even slept in tents on Mumbai ground just so that he could play this game. His hands were no longer hard and callous as he met the ball. He held it softly, and, as a result, edges fell short of the slip cordon. He was playing much closer to his body, watching the ball until the very last moment and playing it late in a fashion that would have made Kane Williamson proud.
And his leaves! They were the star of the show.
No matter the era, a good Test innings is built on deliveries where the batter accepts that the risk is too high to attempt a shot on that. He gets beaten sometimes, and sometimes, he willfully defends or leaves it. Jaiswal showed every single aspect of that in his innings. That’s why he completely left 22 such deliveries in his 193-ball stay on the second day that threatened to exploit his aforementioned earlier pattern of dismissals.
The Australian papers called him the ‘the new King’ as he arrived on the Australian shores. Yesterday, when he batted those 193 deliveries for his 91 runs (and still remains unbeaten), he crowned himself on a throne made from his perseverance.
What about Rahul, though — the perennial misery man of Indian cricket who has turned into a walking meme on social media for being unable to catch a break?
If Jaiswal’s doggedness showed through in his leaves, it was Rahul’s pillowy hands that made it seem as if he was playing with extra padding on his bat. He was adamant about not hitting anything hard, letting the ball come to him, and then he played it with hands so soft that the ball could almost cuddle with his bat.
The technical perfection from the man didn’t just end there. The improvement is evident if you compare his technique with the 2018 Perth Test. His front foot no longer moves across, making his head fall over. As a result, instead of coming from the side occasionally, his bat is now meeting the delivery front with the full face and his front foot planted right behind it. This technique is giving him immaculate balance on the crease, and, as a result, he has centuries in England and South Africa in recent years.
As a result, not only was he able to play the deliveries safely, but he also found himself in a great position to judge and leave the delivery with his bat carefully tucked neatly behind, not just dangling sideways.
All this was displayed when they combated the Australian bowlers in an almost chanceless inning. His hands were so soft that no edges carried to the slip cordon on a pitch that had slowed down.
Rahul also ensured that he talked to Jaiswal and let him know what they were there for, whenever Jaiswal the youngster signs of rash intent. That certainly helped calm Jaiswal in moments that could have turned sour for the youngster. With time, Jaiswal felt comfortable enough on the crease to not only sweep and flick for two sixes but also engage in some innocent tomfoolery with Marnus Labuschagne.
And despite all the contrasting happenings on the day, it was hard to stop wondering if this was the Sachin Tendulkar 1992 and Virat Kohli 2012 moment for the ‘new king’.
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