India v Australia: third one-day international – live!

50th over: Australia 313-5 (Stoinis 31, Carey 21) A slower ball to start from Bumrah, and was there a tiny top edge from Carey? It bounced through to Dhoni, after the batsman either missed or clipped it. Dot ball, any rate. Carey backs away again and middles the next one for four, cutting. But a single follows, and Stoinis misses a wide yorker, just within the wide line. How many dot balls for him today? He gets a length ball to follow and gets a lot of bat on that one, dragging rather than driving away through cover for four! Finds a way. But can only find the field from the last ball, and takes one more run to close.

49th over: Australia 303-5 (Stoinis 26, Carey 16) Shami to Carey, who drives wide enough of straight to get back for the second. He’s also clobbered at the non-striker’s end by the ball as it comes back in. This batting is painful work for this pair. Shami keeps bowling yorkers, the batsmen keep getting singles. Eventually he bowls a rank full ball but Carey can only find the cover sweeper. Stoinis gratefully accepts another poor ball to finish the over with a leg glance for four.

Shami finishes with 1 for 52.

I’m reliably informed that Abhijato’s idea of five balls was tendered to Simon Butler, not to Rob Smyth. We shall see what Smyth makes of it very shortly, then. For me, there is a rhythm in cricket that is all about the evolution or devolution of one cricket ball used through the innings, and I like that. But I’m not averse to the idea that perhaps bowling sides should be able to work on the ball using more liberal methods, under the supervision of the umpire. Everyone is ball-tampering anyway, we’re just pretending it doesn’t happen. So why not standardise it.

48th over: Australia 293-5 (Stoinis 18, Carey 14) Watching Stoinis trying to get going can be like trying to roll-start an old car on a cold morning. He misses a big woof at Bumrah outside off. Then nails a straight drive but straight into Carey’s stumps. Can only get a single by edging a yorker into his foot and nearly breaking a metatarsal. Carey knocks a run immediately into the off side, then Stoinis finally get a ball away by steering a wide yorker to third man. The last ball is into the pad again and he’s thundering down for a single.

47th over: Australia 286-5 (Stoinis 13, Carey 13) Backing away again goes Carey, carving Shami through the off side but this time finding the gap at cover and beating the outfielder for four. Then another much-needed boundary as Carey drives straight down the ground! Timing. He can be very crisp. Carey tries to charge, and Shami spots it and bounces him, beating the stroke and keeping it scoreless. Smart bowling. Carey backs away and nearly hits the cover rope again, but this time the dive thwarts him. The over costs 11.

Jimmy Neesham, detective. What on earth is going on here?

46th over: Australia 275-5 (Stoinis 12, Carey 3) Bumrah. How good is this bloke? Nerves as the Australians are desperate to score, and he takes full advantage. Blocks up Stoinis once, then twice, leaving him squeezing out a single from the third ball. Thunders the fourth into Carey’s pad and nearly has the Aussie keeper running himself out trying a leg bye. Has to go back, then back away and expose all three stumps, taking an outrageous risk to carve a single. Then nearly another run out as Stoinis takes on Jadeja at point. Three singles from the over!

45th over: Australia 272-5 (Stoinis 10, Carey 2) Shami is the bowler now, and Kohli will be glad he held back some overs for his premium pacemen. It works out alright for Australia though, with a single from every ball except the one that Stoinis lumps over point via a cut shot. Even 300 could be tricky from here given the concern about another wicket.

Regarding Ahbijato Sensarma’s proposal from earlier, Geoff Wignall writes that “it’s certainly ingenious but probably unworkable. I recall he suggested it to Rob Smyth during the England-WI ODIs and if the estimable Mr Smyth has serious doubts that’s generally good enough for me. Apart from anything else it would disrupt the rhythm and narrative of the game and the need for adaptability. The crucial issue is always the balance between bat and ball, along with rewarding skill, game intelligence and technique. I don’t see how the multiple balls idea would enhance that.”

Tsk, tsk. Here I am thinking I’ve been presented with a new idea, only to find it’s recycled product. Mr Smyth will be online for the second innings and ready to hand out scoldings. Cross him at your peril.

44th over: Australia 263-5 (Stoinis 3, Carey 0) Two wickets and one run from the 44th over of an ODI. Some bowling.

“Really enjoying this batting by Aus, but is anyone else’s pleasure heightened by already thinking about how Kohli and Dhoni will go about knocking off 380?”

To be fair, Peter Salmon did email that just before all the wickets fell. Revising the total down… down… further…

Stoinis does usually struggle to get going quickly, though he’s powerful when he does. Carey is a bit more sprightly, he opens the batting for his Big Bash team. What can they do with six overs left?

That’s what he does, Kuldeep Yadav! Always at the batsman, always dangerous, and when it’s late in the day and there are new players at the crease, he finds them out. Just a stock ball from Kuldeep, turning into the right-hander’s pad, a testing length that leaves him unsure whether to go back or forward, and stuck on the crease he can only grope across his pad and miss. Plumb in front.

Well, he had to go for it. But in the end Marsh can only find long-on with his attempted straight hit.

43rd over: Australia 262-3 (Marsh 7, Stoinis 2) Fresh off his fielding, Jadeja gets a bowl. And with Maxwell gone, he’s back to conceding four singles from an over. He’s gone for 64 from his 10 overs, but it would have been about 50 without that one big over when Maxwell launched.

42nd over: Australia 258-3 (Marsh 5) Kuldeep bowls wide and that is gorgeous from Maxwell, inside out over cover again for six! Big stride towards that ball, opened up his stance to clear room for the swinging arc, and the swingeing arc, and sent it flat and forcefully into the crowd. A few singles follow. Bloody hell, he’s nearly got to fifty. How did that happen?

But he won’t get there! What a sensational piece of fielding! After a day where India have struggled and stuttered, there’s finally a piece of brilliant. From who else? Jadeja.

Marsh is the one facing the last ball of the over. He gets his cut shot right out of the middle. In front of point, through cover in fact. It’s four. Every day of the week. Except this one, because Jadeja dives across like a movie scene and snares the ball on the bounce. Bounces up himself to get the throw in to Dhoni over the stumps, and Dhoni backhands it as he takes the throw so as not to lose a millisecond, and knocks it into the woodwork as Maxwell reaches for his ground! They didn’t even have time to take a single between that save and the return. Both fielders exceptional, and the combination ends an entertaining innings by a player in form.

41st over: Australia 249-2 (Maxwell 39, Marsh 4) Right then. Ten overs to go. Launch o’clock. Still some miscommunication with the running, as Maxwell cruises on a first run and then is called back by Marsh for a second to deep midwicket. A single follows. Maxwell knows he has to go now, so he tries to plough another Jadeja ball into the crowd, but misses his swipe across the line. Knocks a single instead to keep the strike.

Listening to Mitchell Johnson trying to restrain himself from cracking jokes about Kohli while on Indian television is beautifully balanced set of tensions. Like those awkward British comedies, with a hint of ballet.

40th over: Australia 244-2 (Maxwell 37, Marsh 1) Rayudu’s turn to make a few mistakes, first by letting a ball through at midwicket that gives Maxwell two runs, then by missing a throw when Marsh played to cover and took him on. Maxwell would have been the victim there, responding to his partner’s call to race to the striker’s end, and was nowhere in the frame when that ball passed the stumps. Panic running from Marsh to get off the mark: duck runs. And Maxwell gets a nick on a yorker from the last ball to deny a leg-before shout. All happening. Five runs from Bumrah’s over, which for India could have been three and a wicket.

Dominic has asked for us to say hello to Tommy in Year 5 who “has used maths to calculate that Australia will be somewhere between 180-6 and 225-3 using the the theory that <wickets=>runs and that runs ≈ balls bowled. Pretty good for Year 5 I thought. He’ll be pleased with 208-1.”

Dominic, please. I’m over 30 and I don’t know what any of those symbols mean.

39th over: Australia 239-2 (Maxwell 33, Marsh 0) Interesting call to send Shaun Marsh in next. He’s a quality ODI bat but he’s far from the most destructive in this line-up. Any of Stoinis, Carey, Handscomb probably goes at a higher rate when it’s time to launch. Marsh plays out three dot balls to end Shami’s over, so only two runs from it in total.

Another misfield, as Bumrah goes down on one knee at mid-on and lets the ball through his legs. Bizarre how it can spread through a team like a rash. But he makes up for it a couple of balls later, as Khawaja toe-ends a pull shot to where Bumrah has been moved at midwicket in the circle. A tired shot following an excellent innings, and a huge one in terms of Khawaja’s career. Shami’s nasty blow to the shin that he suffered earlier will be feeling a bit better with his first wicket.

38th over: Australia 237-1 (Khawaja 103, Maxwell 32) Tell you what, Shankar is doing the job today. A couple of times he goes super wide across Khawaja, so full that the batsman can’t crash it away. Khawaja misses one and cribs a single from the other. Four singles and a leg bye from the over. Shankar is very much the sixth bowler but he’s gone at 5.5 an over across eight so far.

37th over: Australia 232-1 (Khawaja 100, Maxwell 31) Finally, an over from Ravindra Jadeja that will not go for three or four runs. Jadeja is around the wicket to the right-handed Maxwell, who strides into the ball and lifts it down the ground for six! Muscle and timing meet. Next ball, he uses his wrists to come across the ball, and flips it flat into the midwicket gap for four! And the next, the best of the lot, seeing some width and going inside out over cover for four! What a shot, perfect timing, and Khawaja just has to watch on while his batting partner feasts.

Maxwell decides that’s enough and taps a single to cover. Khawaja misses a glance and survives an appeal to a ball that’s probably going down leg. Then at last, from the sixth ball of the over, he glances a single away for his century! His very first time in ODI cricket. He’s only playing his 24th match in what has been a patchy and occasional career, and he’s finally got past his previous high mark of 98 to prove that perhaps he does belong in this form of the game. What a time to do it! He’s had a couple of slices of luck but has been excellent in keeping pace with his more attacking opening partner.

16 from the over!

36th over: Australia 216-1 (Khawaja 99, Maxwell 16) Shankar returns. Shami and Bumrah each have four overs left. You just wonder whether one of them should be bowling to a batsman trying to reach his first ODI century? He nails Shankar on the pull shot for two runs to midwicket, then glides a single to move to 99. Three balls left. Will Maxwell find a single? No, Maxwell will shuffle towards the line of the ball and then drive it gorgeously through extra cover for four. Hello.

Now comes the single, dinked to leg. One ball in the over. Khawaja chops it to point and shouts “Nooooo!” as though his partner has been shot with one day left until retirement. His partner is in fact just chilling at the non-striker’s end.

35th over: Australia 208-1 (Khawaja 94, Maxwell 9) Jadeja to Khawaja, doing what he does straight at the stumps. Four singles this time. Profligate.

Occasionally in cricket, no matter how closely one follows the game, one can hear an idea that one has never heard before. Nor considered anything remotely close to it. Abhijato Sensarma has sent me just such an idea.

“I had an idea looking at the different bats smack the ball to all parts of the ground during the WI-England ODI series. As long as the bats meet certain regulations, they can be personalised by the batsmen. So, why can’t the bowlers have personalised balls? All of them shall be submitted to the officials for checks and be with the umpire during the matches, but the players can chose which of them to bowl with during the match and shuffle between them throughout (there will be a limit of five)! As long as the ball is spherical, not hollow from inside, and meeting a logical standard when it comes to the shine, they should be allowed to use their own balls and have their own touches on it (shine, not overtly picked seams, and coatings assisting spinners). It will clear the air about ball tampering, obtaining reverse swing, and bringing back into prominence the finger spinners like the ones from yesteryears, while restoring the balance to the limited overs games we so desperately need in these times of savage hitting. What do you think, Mr Lemon?”

I have no idea what I think of it yet, but I like ingenuity, and while I think about it I’ll throw it open to our Constant Readers.

34th over: Australia 204-1 (Khawaja 94, Maxwell 9) Kuldeep gives a bit of width so Khawaja taps it away and sprints the single to point. Tests out his hamstrings as the throw comes in. Maxwell gets stuck on the crease but goes through with his hefty drive anyway, and lofts it for six! A lot of height on that but it came down on the far side of the rope just in front of the sightscreen.

Drinks! And the 200 up. And Khawaja closing on three figures.

33rd over: Australia 196-1 (Khawaja 93, Maxwell 2) Bumrah now to Maxwell, who blocks one back and then digs out a yorker for a single to mid-off. You’d think they would happy to see off Bumrah, but Khawaja laces a cover drive and only Kohli’s dive at cover can save it. He glides a single instead.

32nd over: Australia 193-1 (Khawaja 92, Maxwell 1) Now what’s this? What’s this! Glenn Maxwell has won a promotion to first drop! Buckle in and get ready for some fun. He gets off the mark first ball by easing a drive down the ground.

That opening stand went past Simon Katich and Gilchrist’s 191 against Sri Lanka in 2006. It finishes as the seventh on Australia’s all-time list. Outstanding.

Kuldeep finally gets his man, though Finch reviews after a long chat with his partner. Might as well, when you’re flying. Is that sliding down leg side? It’s a faster ball zipping off the pitch, but it is sliding leg-side-ish. The umpire gave it out so it only needs to be clipping leg stump. It’s pitched in line, and it’s clattering into leg stump!

31st over: Australia 191-0 (Finch 92, Khawaja 91) Bumrah comes back on, and just as well for India: the match has been drifting and they desperately need a wicket to try and prevent Australia unleashing late in the innings. The ploy doesn’t work immediately though, as Khawaja glides two and then watches a wide sail down leg. Bumrah is around the wicket to the lefty, over it to the right. Finch reaches into a drive to the cover sweeper. Five from the over in total.

Mark Waugh was twice part of an opening stand worth 189: once with Adam Gilchrist and once with Mark Taylor. This pair go past both of those.

30th over: Australia 186-0 (Finch 91, Khawaja 88) Australia still having it all their own way. Single, single, single, then Finch waltzes down and clouts Kuldeep into the midwicket gap once more. Finch is batting in his cap against the two spinners. Survives yet another LBW, probably hit outside the line as he tried to sweep.

29th over: Australia 179-0 (Finch 86, Khawaja 86) This partnership is scaling some heady territory, actually. It’s now 13th on Australia’s list of all-time opening stands in one-day cricket. That’s out of 917 attempts.

Jadeja does his three-single trick again. The batsmen are level on scores.

28th over: Australia 176-0 (Finch 85, Khawaja 84) The batsman have been neck and neck for a while, but Khawaja moves into the lead with six! A big slog sweep, as Kuldeep’s stock ball was turning into the left-hander’s pads. He gets enough of it to carry the boundary rider at midwicket. But a single follows, allowing Finch to take back the lead with a bottom-edged sweep to fine leg for four. Just got a touch on it, thus defusing yet another LBW shout. Phew.

27th over: Australia 161-0 (Finch 80, Khawaja 77) Jadeja loves sprinting through an over to concede three singles. So he does just that.

26th over: Australia 161-0 (Finch 78, Khawaja 76) Kuldeep is desperate to create some measure of control, and manages it with an over conceding five. Yet another big LBW appeal against Finch but he’s managed to get some glove on that ball that was turning into his pads – the googly from the left-hander.

25th over: Australia 156-0 (Finch 76, Khawaja 73) Shankar on for Shami. This is now Australia’s fourth-highest opening partnership in over five years in ODIs, with only three David Warner jobs (two with Finch, one with Travis Head) ahead of it.

The runs keep flowing for Australia. Khawaja pulls four, drives what should be four through cover except that Rayudu bucks the trend to make a good diving save, then the over ends with a glamorous cut shot for four more.