David Shortte’s Test Match Cricket Preview: Australia vs India

Posted on November 19, 2024November 19, 2024 | Posted by David Shortte

The Summer of Test Cricket in Australia is set to commence and the battle for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy has the eyes of the cricketing world firmly fixed on it.

India head into the series fresh off a shock 3-0 Test series loss to New Zealand on home soil last month.

To put the series loss into perspective, since 2013, India had won 18 straight home Test series, so the loss was one of the bigger boilovers in recent test history.

There are question marks on the ability of an ageing Indian top order including sub-continent Legends Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma.

To make things more complicated, Sharma will be missing the first Test of the series to be at the birth of his child, and talented top order batsman Shubman Gill will also miss with injury.

Overall however, India have remained a superpower of world cricket – prior to the loss to New Zealand they defeated Bangladesh 2-0 and were far too strong for England on home soil winning that series 4-1.

It must be said Australia have question marks of their own on a number of their key batsmen.

While Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne have been prolific in their run scoring over their Test careers, their recent form has been below their best and their starts to the Australian summer in white ball cricket and domestic cricket has been steady at best.

With Dave Warner retiring, newcomer Nathan McSweeney will get an opportunity at the top of the order, but he is an unknown at this level and both Mitch Marsh and Travis Head have had limited game time of late with both players away on paternity leave.

Australia have not had a lot of Test action of late but most of their work had been solid defeating New Zealand 2-0 in New Zealand, Pakistan 3-0 in Australia, a 1-1 series draw with West Indies at home and the 2-2 result away against England in last year’s Ashes.

Both sides will head into the series comfortable with their key bowling stocks with the Aussies backing in their proven quartet of Cummings, Starc, Hazlewood and Lyon while India will rely on their experienced pace duo of Bumrah and Siraj while their Spinning Talismen Ravi Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja will take care of the spinning duties.

When it comes to the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, India have had the better of this series for the best part of a decade.

In 2017 India defeated Australia 2-1 on home soil, in 2018-19 India came to Australia and defeated Australia 2-1, in 2020-21 India again defeated Australia 2-1 in Australia and in the most recent series in 2023 India beat Australia again by that 2-1 margin.

The last time Australia defeated India in a series was back in 2014-15 where Australia won 2-0 at home.

From a betting perspective Australia go in the warm favourites in Series betting with TABtouch with Australia paying $1.44, Drawn series at $8.50 and India at $3.75.

I have gone through the key markets and come up with the following plays.

Most Runs Australia – Travis Head @ $4.75*

In recent times when the big matches have been on in either white ball cricket or the Test match arena Travis Head has been outstanding. To me he is the one Australian batsman that is in his cricketing prime right now. The fact he bats in the middle order means he may well be shielded from India’s biggest threat with the ball Jasprit Bumrah and that could prove crucial. In a series where the new ball could do some damage players like Mitch Marsh and Alex Carey are going to be very important in the middle order for Australia as well.

Most Runs India – Yashasvi Jaiswal @ $4*

The dashing left hand opening batsman is one of the most gifted young players in international cricket and while taking on the might of Australia’s pace battery on foreign ground is a challenge he appears up for it.  In India’s recent series loss to New Zealand his 77 in the second innings of the second test was a stunning knock. His attacking nature will mean the Aussies will fancy themselves against him but if he gets set I am backing him to have a few knocks where he will score heavily and quickly and that might be enough to see him score the most for India. I have enormous respect for Rishabh Pant, and he looms as the main threat.

Most Wickets Australia – Pat Cummings $4.75*

There is not a heap separating the Aussie bowling quartet, but I don’t mind the $4.75 on offer about the Skipper taking the most wickets for the home side. It is a huge opportunity for Australia to regain the Border Gavaskar trophy and he will be wanting to lead from the front.

Most Wickets India – Jasprit Bumrah $2.40*

This looks the star bet of the Summer. Bumrah can get it done in any conditions but the Australian wickets with extra speed and bounce are right up his alley. He looms as a handful for the Aussies all Summer long.

Verdict

There are so many question marks heading into this series, but it does look the best opportunity for a long time for the Aussies to get the better of India. I’ll go with a series prediction of Australia 3-1.

*Odds correct at the time of publication.

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