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While India's batting collapsed on Day 2 of the ongoing World Test Championship (WTC) final against Australia, one former cricketer believed that the fault was actually that of the bowling unit led by Pat Cummins.
The pacers bagged four of the five India wickets on Day 2. Skipper Rohit Sharma only managed 15 before he fell off Pat Cummins' bowling. The much-appreciated Shubman Gill literally threw away his wicket to Scott Boland. His sharp delivery outside off-stump seamed in significantly after pitching and rattled Gill's stump. Gill was caught in a fix on whether to leave or hit the ball. However, he didn't tinker with the ball which stormed into the stumps to leave the onlookers stunned and in utter disbelief.
Virat Kohli (14 off 31) and Cheteshwar Pujara (14 off 25) also failed to get the move on, with their wickets taken by Cameron Green and Mitchell Starc respectively. As Day 2 came to a close, Ravindra Jadeja (48 off 51) gave India stability, but he also fell to Nathan Lyon's bowling.
What did the former Pakistan batter say?
But Basit Ali felt that Australia did something to the ball which made the ball swing the other way. He blasted the umpires and the commentators for failing to pick up on this fact
“Firstly, I would clap for those watching the match from commentary box, and the umpires. Australia clearly played with the ball and no one is talking about it. No batter is wondering 'What is happening?' The biggest example is batters getting bowled while leaving the ball.
"Let me give you the evidence too. Until the 54th over when Shami was bowling, the shine was on the outside and the ball moved back into Steve Smith. This is not called reverse swing. Reverse swing is when the shine is on the inside and the ball comes back in,” Ali said on his YouTube channel.
“Look at the 16th, 17th and 18th over, the ball on which Virat Kohli got out... look at the shine. Mitchell Starc had the ball in his hand with the shiny end pointing outside but the ball was moving the other way. Jadeja was hitting the ball on the on-side and the ball was flying over point. Have the umpires gone blind? God knows who all are sitting there who can't see such a simple thing,” he further added.
At stumps, India were trailing by 318 runs, having scored. 151/5. Rahane was still batting on 29 off 71 balls, and at the other end was KS Bharat on 5 off 14.
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