Australia Beat India by 4 Wickets in 2nd T20 Match, Take 1-0 Lead

Melbourne:  Australia won easily against India in the second T20 game at Melbourne Cricket Ground on Friday. The Indian players did not bat well, except for a strong 68 runs by Abhishek Sharma and a helpful 35 by Harshit Rana. Team leader Suryakumar Yadav could not score much with his bat. The Indian side got out for 126 runs before finishing all 20 overs. Josh Hazlewood stood out among Australia's bowlers. He took three wickets for only 13 runs. He got out Shubman Gill, Suryakumar Yadav, and Tilak Varma.

Australia faced a simple job to chase the score. They reached it without trouble, thanks to their captain Mitchell Marsh, who made 46 runs in 26 balls. The home team finished with 6.4 overs left. They now lead 1-0 in the five-game T20 series. The first match got cancelled because of rain. Many Indian batsmen could not reach 10 runs. Eight of them added just 19 runs together.

Abhishek and Harshit made 103 runs between them. Suryakumar Yadav got just one run. In the T20 Asia Cup that ended in September, he made 72 runs in seven games with an average of only 18.00. When chasing 126, Australia's starting batsmen Mitchell Marsh and Travis Head hit Indian bowlers hard in every direction. They built a 50-run first-wicket pair in only 25 balls.

What helped Australia take control early?

The first six overs gave Australia a big lead. Head and Marsh attacked right away and left no room for India to fight back. Head played a fast knock of 28 runs in 15 balls. Varun Chakaravarthy got him out in the fifth over. Then Josh Inglis came to bat with Marsh. Marsh hit Kuldeep Yadav for 20 runs in his first over. Later, Marsh got caught at long off while going for another big shot. When he left, Australia had 87 runs for two wickets in eight overs.

Chakaravarthy showed his skill next. He beat Tim David, who scored just one run. David chipped it back to Chakaravarthy for a simple catch. Australia hit 100 runs in the tenth over. Mitchell Owen nudged the ball for a single to deep backward square leg. In that same over, Owen got a life when Harshit Rana dropped him while running from deep mid-wicket. But in the next over, Kuldeep Yadav got Inglis out for 20 runs off one ball. Marcus Stoinis then joined Owen.

How did India fight back in the chase?

In the 18th over of the India bowling unit, pacer Bumrah took two crucial wickets. He sent Matthew Short on a golden duck and Owen at the score of 14. Before that, in India's innings, Abhishek Sharma saved the day with Harshit Rana helping him. They pushed the score to 125. Abhishek, the top T20I batsman right now, smashed 68 runs in 37 balls.

Harshit stayed steady at the other end with 35 runs in 33 balls. They built a 56-run stand to give India a chance at a good total. Only Abhishek and Harshit got past 10 runs for India. Under Melbourne's dark clouds, Australia's key bowler Josh Hazlewood bowled fast and fiercely after putting India in to bat first. Abhishek batted with his bold style as always. But deputy captain Shubman Gill found it hard to score on the bouncy pitch.

Gill tried to hit out in the third over but got caught by captain Mitchell Marsh. He left with 5 runs off 10 balls. Sanju Samson moved up to number three from lower down. But Nathan Ellis ended his time with a quick ball. Nathan Ellis hit Samson's leg in front of the wickets with a ball that swung in. Samson went back after 2 runs in 4 balls in the fourth over. Abhishek hit back with two fours off Ellis in a row. But Hazlewood changed things by getting an edge from captain Suryakumar Yadav on 1 run off 4 balls to keeper Josh Inglis in the fifth.

Who caused the most trouble for India?

Hazlewood made things worse for India. Tilak Varma faced just two balls and hit it wrong to Inglis for zero. India finished at 40 at the end of the powerplay. The quick losses kept going. In the 8th over of the India innings, all-rounder Axar Patel got out at the score of 7 runs off 12 balls. That brought Harshit up early. The score moved on as the pair kept changing ends often.

Near the end of their stand, Harshit hit a six into the crowd. Then he got out to Xavier Bartlett. Shivam Dube came in and scored 4. He hit a four but then edged one to Inglis. In the 18th over of India's batting innings, Abhishek smashed a four and a towering six to Xavier Bartlett. Nathan Ellis smashed a flawless yorker at Abhishek's toe shortly after. At the end of the game, Varun Chakaravarthy and Jasprit Bumrah did not score many runs. In 18.4 overs, India was bowled out for a score of 125.