India Stun Australia to historically win series 2-1

India Second Innings  329-7 off 97 ov, Gill 91 off 146. 8 fours, 2 sixes, Pujara 56 off 211, 7 fours. Pant 89 off 138, 9 fours, 1 six, Rahane 24 off 22, 1 four, 1 six, Sundar 22 off 29, 2 fours, 1six, Cummins 4-55, Lyon 85-2, Hazlewood 1-74

India wins by 3 wickets.

India inflicts Australia’s first defeat at Gabba since 1988 after a tremendous run chase and takes one of the all-time great series 2-1 Keeping the Border-Gavaskar they won in Australia two years ago. India is celebrating their greatest ever Test triumph as cricket supremacy awaits.

Needing 328 runs, plagued with injury the tourists got home with three overs to spare. Shubman Gill made 91 and Rishabh Pant was unbeaten on 89. It is one of the finest Test Series wins by any away side, especially without their star players who were injured like Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, and Indian captain Virat Kohli who only played the first test before departing to be at the birth of his first child and recovered from being bowled out for 36 their lowest ever total in Test cricket- in losing the series opener by eight wickets. Thereafter India won the second test by eight-wicket, then batting through the final day to earn a draw in the third.

The tourists were 4-0 overnight and for them to even get to the point where victory might be possible, Cheteshwar Pujara had to come through a barrage of hostile bowling from the Australia quicks as he was hit 10 times in his 56, despite that he added 114 for the second wicket with the free-scoring Gill.  Then stand-in captain Ajinkya Rahane influenced India’s fightback with 24 off only 22 balls. Pat Cummins was the effective fast bowler for Australia removing Pujara, Rahane, and Rohit Sharma. Although India knew a draw would see them retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, they never lost sight of a remote chance of victory and promote wicketkeeper Pant to number five. In the final hour, India was 259-4 need a further 69 runs with six wickets remaining from the final 15 overs.

Cummins had Mayank Agrawal caught at cover for the fourth wicket and Sundar was bowled trying to reverse sweep Nathan Lyon and Shardul Thakur miscued Josh Hazelwood, but left-hander Pant could not be stopped as his drive down the ground off Hazelwood secured a famous win.

Rahane said “I don’t know how to describe this victory. I am really proud of all the boys. We didn’t talk about anything after Adelaide, we just wanted to show good character and express ourselves. It was all about team effort”.

Player of the series Cummins said, “The whole India side played fantastically and deserved to win the game was there for to win, but we didn’t take the wickets.”

England begins a four-Test series against India followed nu limited-over games, in Chennai on 5 February.