World Cup 2023: How Rahul, Kohli wove magic after spinners bamboozled Australia

Old warrior Virat Kohli and his reconstruction partner K L Rahul took the team out of an impossibly lost situation against Australia by crafting a win in their inaugural match in the ongoing World Cup despite the team recording three ducks in a row at the mouth. Meenakshi Rao writes on this low-scoring but intense survival campaign crafted by the Kohli-Rahul duo at Chennai on a pitch that was acting up.

Chennai: People with “unfinished business” can ill afford to script such incredibly dubious records: Three ducks in a row at the mouth of the innings. This is the first time India recorded this unwanted statistic in their ODI history, that too on a day when their bowlers had delivered like seldom before, restricting the Australians to a 199 score.

But then, if you have rescue and relief firefighters like Virat Kohli and KL Rahul on your rolls, such disasters can be navigated and negated, as was seen at Chepauk on a muggy evening that came under the lights with many a twist and turn.

It is here that India started its World Cup campaign in real earnest by winning an impossible situation against Australia in 41.2 overs by six wickets at a score of 201 for 4. From 2 for 3 to the final score, it was a legendary fightback by two warriors – Virat Kohli and K L Rahul who crafted a 165-run partnership to save the night. Within the first three overs, the Oz attack derailed the playlist of the entertainment block in the stadium, brought nervy silence in the stands and gave heart attacks to the really passionate ones among the Team India lovers.

Australia struck early with Ishan Kishan, a replacement for an ailing Shubman Gill, swinging away without propriety or caution. It was a loose shot and gave him what was the natural corollary to such behaviour – a golden duck on a thick edge to Cameron Green at first slip. Captain Rohit Sharma was the next to go, however to a good ball. A desperate referral could not save him after one by Josh Hazelwood came back sharp to hit his pads right in front of the wicket.

India with two down for two runs, had made it two ducks and an impossible journey ahead. In the very next breath, Shreyas Iyer walked in and out by throwing caution like a frisbee to the winds and India recorded its third duck! Self-engineered, self-massacre – that’s what you will call it. Iyer casually drove to death on a slow pitch and straight into the hands of David Warner off Josh Hazelwood.

With India at two for three wickets, the Australians were breathing again while the hosts were scurrying for a ventilator. The huge entertainment deck started working overtime to rev up faith in the crowd but the chants of “India-India” sounded faded and jaded. This is the time to say, never underestimate the power of a down-and-out Starc or an ageing Hazelwood.

In ordinary circumstances too the Australians are tough nuts to crack, a fact reinforced at Chepauk under the lights. At the end of fours overs, India showed up in a dismal chamber: Ten for the loss of three wickets, the openers had been eaten up without premise and the silence of the lambs in the stands started getting palpable even as Kohli started a difficult ascend to a low score that had started looking like a mountain that needed sherpas like Kohli and Rahul to offset such an unexpected avalanche.

Kohli, a veteran of many difficult situations in the past, and dogged campaign executions, got lucky with a life that he top-edged into a high hoop which went through the hands of a running Mitchel Marsh. Kohli breathed, thankfully not his last in the crease, even as Ishan Kishan got aggressive in the dugout! Kohli and KL Rahul brought some amount of sanity to the lunacy of the moment that had hit Team India by crawling slowly and steadily from 2 for 3 in the second over to 38 for 3 in the 13th over. Indeed, they had a task at hand – dealing with the tricks of the pitch and somehow mending the broken backbone of the team.

A foot soldier of many battles small and big, Kohli put himself to work on a Sunday night with his partner in reconstruction Rahul supporting him cheek by jowl. Rahul is a different player after his return from injury but today he was dislodged from his No 4 position to come in as No 5. But that did not deter his stability and sheet anchor role for the team.

By the 15th over and the first drinks break, the Indian score looked recuperative – one short of 50 with hope starting to flutter in broken Indian hearts. Kohli took 50 balls to get to his second boundary through flick shots to midwicket and followed it up with an identical twin in the next ball after treating Cameron Green with a no-run salute for four balls of the over.

Caution and valour had returned home so relief was only natural in the stands. The chase had begun to add muscle, making Cummins turn to his ultimate weapon on this surface – Adam Zampa in the 18th over. This time Rahul responded with an array of late cuts and shots reaching the boundary back-to-back three times in the over – two to deep third man and one to mid-on, scoring 13 off turner burner Zampa.

The fourth wicket partnership of 71 runs in 103 balls became a comfort statistic floating around as the two warriors in the middle started inching toward the first pit stop – a 100 without losing a wicket. Finally, the Brazilian waves started happening and the torchlight show in the stand lit up the proceedings. The 150-run partnership came in 200 balls. Kohli’s hard-earned and beautifully crafted, not to mention dogged, 50 came in the 25th over in 75 balls and a measured three fours, denoting the extreme caution he observed in difficult conditions.

India’s 100 came in the 26th over. The 100-run partnership came alongside in 146 balls giving life to perceived death in the opening sequence of the Indian act. From then on it was slow but steady aggrandisement with both batters to reach the target in… overs began as the Australians lost the plot despite the early strikes. When all was but achieved, Kohli gave one straight pull into the hands of Labuschagne at mid-wicket to walk back at 75 when it was just 33 runs to victory. His 75 came in 116 balls with six boundaries and a 165-run partnership with Rahul.

It was now another warrior, Hardik Pandya’s, turn to take the campaign to its logical end with just 33 runs left for victory in 13 overs. With him came the final blow a scurry of sixes, one by Hardik and two by K L Rahul as Maxwell smarted and India needed just eight more to cross the frontier. Earlier, the Kohli and Rahul pair tamed the collective fear of their mates in the dressing room and their 38000 spectators. The two also tamed the pitch which was acting up and the Australian arm. Most hearteningly Kohli and Rahul did so from a tight corner from where, coming out and performing would be a story of great escape that will go into the annals, much like Kohli’s other impossible campaign against Pakistan in Melbourne during the T20 World Cup match in 2022 just a day before Diwali where his task was to make 28 runs in just eight balls.

In 2023, this will give the team some shock and awe before walking into the big one against Pakistan in Motera, of course after navigating a resurgent Afghanistan in Delhi on the 11th of this month.