The Indian cricket team is ready to host Australia for the last battle in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy series. The summit clash is set to take place on 3rd January at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Days before the all-important game, SCG social media has posted a video that depicts how the pitch preparation is going on at the venue. In the clip, SCG curator Adam Lewis said: “So we’re two days out now, getting to the final stages of the prep. We’ve taken the covers off this morning, given it a cut about 7mm and giving it a nice roll today, nice pressing, really happy where it’s at.
“Just giving it a little flick of water, very hot in Sydney today, so just keeping the moisture there just at the top. And then tomorrow, we’ll do a little bit more heavier rolling, take a little bit of the colour out, then we should be ready to go for the third.”
Ahead of the fifth and final Test between Australia and India, wicketkeeper-batter Alex Carey expressed his mood on the team’s terrific victory on the last day of the Melbourne Test. Australia, 184 runs in front of India at Melbourne, and up 2-1 in the series, has also extinguished the flames on India’s pathway towards an early qualification for the World Test Championship (WTC) Final to be played at Lord’s early next year. Australia currently leads 2-1 against India in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
I really feel fortunate being part of it; I really feel lucky to play cricket into this type of match. Thousands of thousands of messages finally made their way to all the boys. Just how special it was for, and still possibly will be for, not just the players, I think, for the spectators, the 370-odd thousand that were there, watching at home. It’s a test-matching memory for a long time. Now we will have to take it quite quickly ahead, because we played well and will head to Sydney in a couple of days’ time, where we will be pushing for a border Gavaskar trophy, said Alex Carey during the pre-match press conference.
To make the contest much easier for Australia at Day 5 while they attempt to Level a goal of 330 runs to win the Boxing Day Test, Starc full steamed into the attack with a full pace despite faltering due to a poor fitness condition.
Australia on the morning of Day 05 declared at 340 runs in front of India as the target. The visitors had the whole day in hand but couldn’t derive what they could. The fiery spells from the Aussie bowling attack bundled out India at a meager 155 in the 80th over.
Pat Cummins was named ‘Player of the Match’ in light of his stupendous performance with both bat and ball.
