AUS vs IND 2024/25 Australia vs India 4th Test Day 4 Melbourne Match Report 26 – 30 Dec 2024

On By Littum

Australia 474 and 228 for 9 (Labuschagne 70, Lyon 41*, Bumrah 4-56, Siraj 3-66) lead India 369 (Reddy 114, Jaiswal 82, Boland 3-57, Cummins 3-89) by 333 runs

In one of the most absorbing days of Test cricket you could wish to see, another remarkable performance from Jasprit Bumrah blew the game wide open. But Marnus Labuschagne and Pat Cummins played their second vital innings of the match before the last wicket pair of Nathan Lyon and Scott Boland extended Australia’s lead to 333, and potentially beyond India’s reach.

Having kept themselves in the game for so much of the day, India were frustrated by Lyon and Boland, who managed a valuable 55 runs and could not be separated on day four. Lyon should have been Bumrah’s fifth wicket in the final over of the day when he reached third slip where KL Rahul somehow kept the ball between his legs but an exhausted Bumrah had overstepped. Lyon ended up taking 14 from the over to finish the day with their joint second-highest Test score.

Regardless of India’s eventual target, it will no doubt evoke memories of events at the Gabba in 2021, especially with the nature of how the lower order kept them in the contest on day three. As on that occasion, they will again have to defy history: no team has ever chased a higher fourth-innings total for a win at the MCG, the highest being England’s 332 for 7, which they achieved in 1928. A crowd of 299,329 watched the match over the first four days, the highest ever attendance for a Boxing Day Test.

Earlier, Nitish Kumar Reddy’s maiden century narrowed Australia’s first-innings advantage to 105. India’s new-ball bowling, with Bumrah well supported by Mohammed Siraj and Akash Deep, made life extremely difficult for the top order, with the home side trailing by just two and one half runs one over. But at 80 for 2 – a lead of 185 – more comfortable territory loomed for Australia, only for the picture to change dramatically.

Steven Smith’s wicket sparked a collapse of 4 for 11 in three overs in the first part of the afternoon session, which included Bumrah’s 200th Test wicket as he removed Travis Head, Mitchell Marsh and Alex Carey in an electric passage of play.

But at 99 for 6 came a potentially defining moment when Labuschagne, on 46, was bowled at gully by Yashasvi Jaiswal as he appeared to slide the hapless Deep to third. Jaiswal, who had blasted Usman Khawaja at leg-well early on, had a day to forget in the field as he also gave Cummins a life in the final over before tea when he missed a low chance at silly point.

Labuschagne and Cummins extended their partnership to 57, each run feeling like gold dust, before Labuschagne was lbw to Siraj, who had his best day in the series since Perth.

Any notion that Australia would freely add to their lead soon vanished in the morning as India bowled superbly with the new ball on a pitch offering more seam movement than previous days. This time Bumrah got the better of Sam Konstas as he seamed one through the wicket and didn’t hold back in a celebration that seemed to mimic Konstas’ interactions with the crowd.

Bumrah moved the ball so much that it was sometimes impossible to hit, while both Akash and Siraj were challenging, although the former might have wanted to pitch the ball more full. The advantage of batting a fraction more was shown when Siraj got a delivery through Khawaja. At one point during the morning session, the broadcast said Australia’s batters had been bowled 21 times in 18 overs.

Shortly after lunch, Labuschagne and Smith, who had started the innings within 51 of 10,000 runs, looked to be trying to pick up the pace, but any thought of that was quickly shut down.

Siraj opened the door when Smith chased a wide delivery, then Rohit Sharma sensed a moment and immediately brought back Bumrah, who was breathtaking. With his second delivery he had Head flicking to forward square leg and four deliveries later he continued Marsh’s lean streak with a delivery that climbed and brushed the glove. Marsh was left with 73 runs in seven innings (47 of which came in one knock) and is likely to be at the center of much debate ahead of the Sydney Test regardless of the result here.

When Bumrah hit one sharply back at Alex Carey, the match threatened to be turned on its head barely 24 hours after India looked set to concede a lead of over 200. Then came Labuschagne’s dismissal and Australia breathed again.

Scoring was never free, but Labuschagne constructed one of the most important innings of his career, even if at times he could only smile when another delivery would whistle past his edge. Overs like one from Deep that went for nine – with a boundary each to Labuschagne and Cummins – were like little momentum shifts.

When the pair survived Bumrah’s first trouble after tea, it felt like a good result for Australia, but Siraj produced a superb delivery to earn an lbw against Labuschagne, which was upheld on the umpire’s call.

Mitchell Starc fell to a misunderstanding with Cummins and some brilliant work from Rishabh Pant who removed a glove to collect Reddy’s throw from the deep and produced a direct hit at the non-striker’s end. Cummins then made Jadeja slip after producing his highest number of runs in a Test.

The contributions from the lower order have made Australia favourites, although nothing feels certain.

Andrew McGlashan is deputy editor at ESPNcricinfo