Former India spinner Harbhajan Singh has said that India have been outplayed on the first two days of the World Test Championship (WTC) final. However, Australia posted a massive first-innings total of 469 after being asked to bat first at The Oval in London. They then reduced India to 151/5 by the end of play on Day 2 (Thursday, June 8) and are headed for a massive first-innings lead as well.
While reviewing the game on Star Sports, Harbhajan said: “There are no two opinions about that. They have dismissed five batters for 151 runs. We will definitely say that Australia are on top in this game. I feel the scale has been tilted towards Australia on both days. India won the toss but they haven’t won even one session after that. Today morning’s session was quite good for India but we cannot say that we won that because there also they scored close to 100 runs, although we did get wickets. The two days of play, Australia have dominated thus far.”
However, Australia finished Day 1 of the ongoing WTC final at 327/3. They lost four wickets in the first session of Day 2, including centurions Travis Head and Steve Smith, but they scored 95 more runs in the 24 overs bowled as well. And, Harbhajan Singh applauded the Australian bowlers for bowling with accurate line and length.
“The way they bowled, the line and length were absolutely perfect. They pitched the ball up. When you get lbw and bowled on this pitch, it means your length was full, whether you talk about (Scott) Boland, (Pat) Cummins or (Cameron) Green – whichever bowlers bowled. The ball Starc bowled to Virat Kohli was unplayable. Who says spinners don’t have a job on a green pitch – Lyon showed that no matter how the pitch is, the bowler needs to have the might. All the bowlers Australia gave responsibility to, they gave them wickets,” Harbhajan Singh concluded.
