'It's Insane'- Damien Fleming Shocked By India's Horrific Batting Display
Updated - 08 Nov 2023, 01:14 PM
Former Australian fast bowler Damien Fleming has admitted that he was left shell-shocked by the manner in which Team India capitulated during their innings in the pink ball Test at the Adelaide Oval.
On the third day of the first Test that started with the game evenly-poised, the duo of Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood wreaked havoc courtesy of relentless seam-and-swing bowling to shot the Indians put for their record-lowest score of 36 in their history.
36 all-out is the fifth-lowest total ever recorded in the history of Test cricket and for Damien Fleming, who was commentating for the BBC during the Test match, it was like watching the ‘U-12s’, and the record-low of 36 is something he still can’t believe.
“I see it, I see 36, but I don’t believe it. It’s insane. The last time I saw that would have been under-12s,” Stephen Fleming was quoted as saying by the BBC.
”I wouldn’t have wanted to see Australia chasing 180 on that.”- Damien Fleming
The display by Pat Cummins and especially by Josh Hazlewood, who recorded a five-wicket-haul in a mere 25 deliveries, will go down as one of the greatest displays of fast bowling that one would ever see. Relentless on and around the off-stump with surgical precision, the duo just didn’t allow the Indian batsmen to have a breather. Reacting to India’s horror display, former Indian opener Sunil Gavaskar reckoned chose to pay his tribute to the Australian seamers, adding that any batting line-up would have struggled to counter such hostility.
Coming back to Damien Fleming, the former fast bowler reckoned that the Australians did not bowl a single bad bowl even though he thought that the pitch did not aid them excessively.
He added that Indian bowlers would have felt hard done by as it was their effort in Australia’s first innings that helped the Men in Blue to take a 53-run-lead. Fleming reckoned that it would have been pretty tough for the home side to chase anything close to 180 in the fourth inning and the only way that the hosts could have staged a comeback is by knocking over India cheaply in the 3rd innings, which is exactly what they did.
“It wasn’t excessive. But they didn’t bowl a bad ball. And India’s bowlers could rightly feel like ‘what have we done?’ I wouldn’t have wanted to see Australia chasing 180 on that.” Damien Fleming said.
