Twitter Celebrates as India Begin Test Series With Thrilling Win

It went down to the wire but India just about held their nerve at the end to beat Australia by 31 runs on the final day of the first Test at Adelaide to win only their sixth Test in the country. The visitors had reduced Australia to 115 for 5 but the Australian lower order fought brilliantly to take the game close.

What a way to start the series!#TeamIndia never released the pressure. Superb batting by @cheteshwar1 with crucial knocks in both innings, @ajinkyarahane88 in the 2nd innings and excellent contributions by our 4 bowlers. This has brought back memories of 2003. #INDvAUS pic.twitter.com/4gmviaKeCC

— Sachin Tendulkar (@sachin_rt) December 10, 2018

Test Cricket is Best Cricket. Great fight by Australia in the end but India were too good. Winning after being 41-4 in first innings is a special effort. Outstanding Test match for Pujara and great effort from our bowlers. Promises to be a great series #AusvInd pic.twitter.com/PEYzKuBsap

— Virender Sehwag (@virendersehwag) December 10, 2018

So close.... Fighting effort from the Aussies today👏🏻👏🏻. Congratulations to India on a very impressive Test Match victory 🇦🇺🇮🇳🏏

— Michael Clarke (@MClarke23) December 10, 2018

Great fight from Australia’s lower order today & it should be - this is test cricket. Terrific test match & congrats to @imVkohli & his men on a wonderful victory ! Bring on Perth 👍

— Shane Warne (@ShaneWarne) December 10, 2018

India began the day in the best possible fashion with Ishant Sharma bowling a surprise bouncer to Travis Head who had no answer and was caught at gully by Ajinkya Rahane.

Brilliant from Ishant. His bouncer to dismiss Head was fast 139.62 kph - a couple of ks quicker than the previous ball & his match average. The key though, was the direction: it was straight & Head had nowhere to hide. Ishant averages 15 with straight bouncers v LHs. #AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/Eys2GAnn3B

— Freddie Wilde (@fwildecricket) December 10, 2018

The Australian batting though continued to fight on as Shaun Marsh brought up his first fifty in the fourth innings of a Test and applied himself really well before falling to Jasprit Bumrah for 60.

There’s the end of it I reckon. Good knock from Marsh - ball from Bumrah was just too good #AUSvIND

— Brett Graham (@worldofBG) December 10, 2018

Jasprit Bumrah, you absolute beauty. When nothing was happening he got the ball to move off the surface. Well played, Shaun Marsh. #AUSvIND

— KASHISH (@crickashish217) December 10, 2018

Rishabh Pant meanwhile was in the thick of things with his commentary behind the wickets.

While the players take lunch, hear some of @RishabPant777's commentary during the first session. #AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/f6L99inRwX

— cricketnext (@cricketnext) December 10, 2018

Cummins was indeed encouraged by the words from Pant as he stitched a frustrating 41-run stand with Mitchell Starc for the eight wicket.

Pat Cummins is the sort of lower order bat who doesn't give his wicket away easily. At Gabba last year, Aus were 209/7 with almost 100 runs adrift. Cummins joined Steve Smith to put on 66 runs for 8th wkt. He scored 42 of those runs facing 120 balls for over 2 hours! #AUSvIND

— Ananthasubramanian (@_chinmusic) December 10, 2018

Cummins has looked a lot secure facing Ashwin in this session with 16% false shots compared to a significantly higher 45% in the previous session, despite Ashwin bowling slower and targeting the stumps more often this session. #AUSvIND

— The Cricket Prof. (@CricProf) December 10, 2018

Ravichandran Ashwin bowled a long spell through the final day but failed to find enough bite from the pitch.

It would be a nice comparison of the pitch maps of Ashwin and Nathan Lyon on split screen #FoxSports

— Laxman Sivaramakrishnan (@LaxmanSivarama1) December 10, 2018

R Ashwin has bowled 50 or more overs in a Test innings only on four occasions in his Test career.
He has now done so twice at Adelaide (53 overs in 2012)#AusvInd #AusvsInd

— Mohandas Menon (@mohanstatsman) December 10, 2018

Shami eventually won the battle of patience against Starc and had him caught behind to give Pant a record of becoming the first Indian wicketkeeper to take 11 catches in a Test.

Most catches by a 'keeper in Tests 👇 @RishabPant777 equals a world record.

India's barren run of 3⃣9⃣7⃣8⃣ days without a Test victory in Australia is looking closer than ever to being ended today.#AUSvIND #INDvAUS #INDvsAUS #AUSvsIND pic.twitter.com/7Cklxi7swb

— Victor Tarapore (@VictorTarapore) December 10, 2018

Bumrah was once again the man for crisis for India, as he had Cummins caught in the slips to leave India a wicket away.

Well played @patcummins30 terrific courage & effort ! A lot of the top order could take a leaf out of your book re technique, shot selection and determination ! First penciled in on my Aust X1’s team sheet

— Shane Warne (@ShaneWarne) December 10, 2018

Interesting- Since Australia were 84-4 , the partnerships have been 31, 41, 31, 41, 31 .#AusvInd

— VVS Laxman (@VVSLaxman281) December 10, 2018

The pair of Nathan Lyon and Josh Hazlewood kept the Indian bowlers at bay but Ishant would have had the former lbw but he had overstepped.

Good thing our cricketers were not in charge of human evolution.
We'd have never got rid of the tail.

— Ramesh Srivats (@rameshsrivats) December 10, 2018

BREAKING - umpire has called a no ball!!! #AUSvIND

— Gaurav Kalra (@gauravkalra75) December 10, 2018

At the end, it was Ashwin who took his first wicket of the day to get rid of Josh Hazlewood to help India win the first Test of the series for the first time in Australia.

Finally! A long wait but what a win. Truly sensational. Exciting moments all around. Congratulations and well played guys. @BCCI #AusvInd pic.twitter.com/28gZGBIorz

— R P Singh (@rpsingh) December 10, 2018

Great win by team India @BCCI. Bowlers have put their hands up and performed exceptionally. But one man made the difference in both the innings @cheteshwar1 just like Rahul bhai did years ago in the same ground 👏 #AUDvIND

— Irfan Pathan (@IrfanPathan) December 10, 2018