World Test Championship final 2023 LIVE: India in trouble as Aussies chase quick wickets

All happening in the first over. A thick edge from Thakur, Boland again giving him all sorts of trouble and it flies high and wide to Usman Khawaja in the slips cordon.

He gets a hand to it but nothing more, Thakur scurries two to get off the mark. Would’ve been a fantastic take and ominous stuff to say the least for India. It’s Pat Cummins from the other end and he’s started with a bit of wobble too, not bad for a ball that’s 40 overs old.

Here’s the footage of Boland’s early scalp too.

India: 6-157 (Rahane 31*, Thakur 4*) Australia lead by 312 runs

Whooshka. One ball drifting down leg, then Boland rattles the woodwork the very next!

Cannons into the stumps and Bharat is on his way from the very first ball he faces in the day. Seamed back in and Bharat beaten all ends up. Boland spoke just before play about learning the right length in England, that’s it son. Superb start.

Thakur rapped on the gloves with the next for good measure. India, well and truly up the creek already.

India: 6-152 (Rahane 30*, Thakur 0*) Australia lead by 317 runs

Players have made their way out to the middle, glorious English sunshine – there is such a thing – greeting them.

Scott Boland taking the ball, the number 41-ranked bowler in the world but punching well above that, just ask anyone who’s saddled up at the other end. Four slips to start and Rahane tucks a single down the legside from the first ball.

India: 5-152 (Rahane 30*, Bharat 5*) Australia lead by 317 runs

Daniel Brettig: Australia’s loss of 7-108 was certainly more charitable for India than anything on day one, even if the Oval pitch had kept playing tricks throughout.

When they took the ball, Starc and Pat Cummins started out as though bearing gifts for India’s openers, dropping short or drifting full and wide for a flurry of early boundaries.

Boland was in no mood for such indulgence. For the championship cycle, no other bowler had been more economical, nor devastating. His long-awaited first spell with a Dukes ball in the English summer turned the day definitively towards Australia.

Over the past 18 months, Boland has struck fear into the hearts of opponents by asking constant questions of their ability to protect their stumps, pads and both edges of the bat. His lines and lengths whir unremittingly towards the off stump.

Rohit Sharma, who had absorbed Boland successfully enough on a spinners’ surface in Nagpur a few months back, looked immediately discomforted, and succumbed lbw in Cummins’ next over.

But his exit was something of an entree for Boland’s masterly unpicking of Shubman Gill. Subtly angling his position on the bowling crease while offering a wobble seam on a pitch now composed of patchwork cracking, Boland drew a series of forward defences.

Steadily he zoned in on off stump – were Boland an MLB pitcher, he would be a Greg Maddux, adept at “painting the corners” of the strike zone with just enough subtle variation to keep batters guessing.

Gill, having played the first three balls of the over, guessed it would be safe to let the fourth pass, as it pitched wider than the rest. Imagine his horror, then, when the wobble seam saw it snake back and clatter off and middle stumps. Had they been watching, Boland’s former quarry from England, West Indies and South Africa would doubtless have offered a knowing, wry grin at the sight.

Read the full story here.

Evening Richie, evening all. Winter cricket. Name something better. I dare you.

Coming to you live from the Maroubra bureau with the footy on in the background, Australia have the ascendency at the Oval and lead by 318 runs with India five down for not enough in the first innings.

It’s a thoroughly deserved lead for Pat Cummins’ side and no two ways about it, the Test is well and truly on the line with India’s last recognised batters – Ajinkya Rahane 29*, Srikar Bharat 5* – at the crease this morning. We’ve got play due to begin at 7.30pm AEST and will be with you until the wee hours.

Australia’s bowlers have sent an emphatic warning to England about their ultra-attacking “Bazball” approach for the coming Ashes after demolishing India’s batting in the World Test Championship final at the Oval on Thursday.

India collapsed to 4-71 before recovering somewhat to be 5-151 at stumps on the second day in reply to Australia’s 469.

Australia’s innings was built around a 285-run partnership between Steve Smith (121) and Travis Head (163). Smith resumed on 95 and brought up his 31st Test century flicking successive boundaries off the first over of the day.

He now averages 102 at the Oval with three centuries in four innings and his overall career average is back above 60 in rarefied air.

Smith questioned how England could succeed with their “Bazball” approach in conditions like those offered up at the Oval.

“I think it will be difficult on this kind of wicket that’s up and down and seaming around,” he said. “It’s not easy to defend, let alone come out and swing.

“I’m intrigued to see how it goes against our bowlers. I’ve said that all along. They’ve obviously done well against some other attacks, but they haven’t come up against us yet, so we’ll see.

“It’s obviously been exciting to watch. I must say I’ve enjoyed watching the way they’ve played and the way they’ve turned things around in the last 12 months or so, but we’ll wait and see how it comes off against us.”

Read Malcolm Conn’s full match report here.