The Border Gavaskar Trophy has been a hotbed for battles between all time greats, be it Shane Warne against Sachin Tendulkar or Glenn McGrath versus Rahul Dravid. The modern iteration of the same has emerged to be the tussle between Jasprit Bumrah and Steve Smith, as witnessed at the MCG on Friday.
Australia posted a mammoth first innings total of 474 in the first innings of the Boxing Day Test on the back of a resplendent Steve Smith ton, his 140 the second century in as many games and a record 11th against India. The Indian bowlers failed to find plans that could challenge the unorthodox technique of the maestro, except a certain Jasprit Bumrah who unsurprisingly ended up being the team’s best bowler again with figures of 4/99. The right-arm quick was all over Smith in his first burst of the day with a six-over old ball with the veteran unbeaten overnight of 68, and the Baggy Green did not shy from acknowledging his rival’s genius.
On one occasion, Bumrah pitched a delivery slightly back of a length angling into the channel with Smith typically shuffling across the stumps. It seemed like the Australian had all bases covered as he pushed forward for a defence but the Kookaburra nipped away wickedly to narrowly miss the outside edge on the way to Rishabh Pant. The quality of the delivery took Smith by surprise and he almost instinctively flashed a thumbs up in his follow-through. However, Bumrah was not done yet. The ace pacer repeated the delivery, only this time making the red cherry seam slightly less to go past the outside edge and hit the back pad, drawing some more astonished expressions from Smith.
Eventually, however, Bumrah was unable to scalp his counterpart and it took some luck from Akash Deep to finally get rid of the centurion.
The battle between Steve Smith and Jasprit Bumrah is delivering early 🎆#AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/guoWglsJBT
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) December 26, 2024
