Ahmedabad: Opener Shubman Gill brought up a wonderful century, also his second ton in Test cricket as India reached 188/2 in 63 overs and trail Australia by 292 runs at tea on day threes play in the fourth match of Border-Gavaskar Trophy series at Narendra Modi Stadium on Saturday.
Gill is currently unbeaten on 103 off 197 balls, his first Test hundred in India, laced with ten fours and a six, with Virat Kohli giving him company after facing four balls in the session as Cheteshwar Pujara fell at the stroke of tea to Todd Murphy.
The start of second session for Gill was exquisite, closing the face of the bat at the right moment to clip Cameron Green through mid-on for four. Pujara, on the other hand, used the pace from Green’s short ball to guide it fine for four.
From there, Australia kept Gill and Pujara in check for 97 balls. But the duo managed to negotiate a tricky phase really well when Australia dried up the runs and never lost their calm.
Gill then broke the shackles in the 57th over with back-to-back boundaries – a punch on backfoot through cover was followed by a sumptuous cover-drive between mid-off and cover. Pujara used his feet against Murphy to drive down the ground for four, followed by Gill dancing down the pitch to smash a boundary off Nathan Lyon.
Gill then reached the three-figure mark with a sweep over the leg slip off Murphy, with a sizeable crowd rising to applause a magnificent knock. But the off-spinner closed the over with a wicket, trapping Pujara lbw with a delivery which turned in and went past the inside edge to hit him low on pads.
Lyon threatened Kohli by beating him and edging short of slip in the final over, closing a session where Gill dazzled under the bright Ahmedabad sun.
Brief Scores: Australia 480 in 167.2 overs (Usman Khawaja 180, Cameron Green 114; Ravichandran Ashwin 6/91, Mohammed Shami 2/134) lead India 188/2 in 62 overs (Shubman Gill 103 not out, Cheteshwar Pujara 42; Todd Murphy 1/18, Matthew Kuhnemann 1/20) by 292 runs
(IANS)
