Cheteshwar Pujara playing the role of an anchor during India's back-to-back Border Gavaskar Trophy triumphs on their last two tours of Australia was missed by the visitors who suffered a batting collapse on Friday in their first innings of the Perth Test.
FOLLOW LIVE: 1st Test, Day 2"Pujara is the obvious miss," said former England player-cum-commentator Mark Nicholas on live broadcast.
After stand-in skipper Jasprit Bumrah won the toss and opted to bat on a pacer-friendly pitch at the Optus Stadium, India lost half the side for a mere 59 runs after pacers Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood combined to run through India's top order.
KL Rahul did all the hard work, like Pujara did to wear the Australian bowlers down during the 2018-19 and 2020-21 tours, and faced 73 deliveries to score 26 runs; but Starc managed to find an edge on his next delivery to Rahul, which was safely pouched by wicketkeeper Alex Carey.
Pujara's contribution in India's wins in Australia is not just measured by the runs he scored but also the time he spent on the crease to lock one end up, which not just frustrated the Australian bowlers but also wore them down.
In the 2018-19 tour, Pujara's series-topping 521 runs came off 1258 balls, while including 3 centuries and 1 fifty. In 2020-21, Pujara was India's second best scorer and fourth overall in the series, making 271 runs off a mammoth 928 balls.
In 2024, Pujara is part of the Star Sports commentary panel while still being an active cricketer available to play. His last appearance for India was in the World Test Championship final in June last year, where India lost to Australia.
Besides Rahul, none of India's top-order batters could get going --- Jasiswal scored an 8-ball duck, Devdutt Padikkal faced 23 balls but failed to score, while Virat Kohli was snared by Hazlewood for just 5.
In the middle order, Dhruv Jurel (11) and Washington Sundar (4) fell to Mitchell Marsh.
It was left to wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant to do the repair job; and he mixed caution with aggression, though was lucky to be dropped by Cummins on 25, alongside an equally attacking debutant Nitish Kumar Reddy to take India past the 100-run mark.
At the time this report was published, India were 114/6 in 42 overs, with Pant batting on 36 and Reddy on 22.
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