Thursday Dec 12, 2024
Thursday Dec 12, 2024
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Australian batsmen Adam Voges (L) and Shaun Marsh (R) take more runs from the West Indies bowling on the second day of the first cricket Test match in Hobart on 11 December – AFP
AFP: Nathan Lyon put the skids under the flailing West Indies as Australia set course for an overwhelming early victory despite Darren Bravo holding on in the first Test in Hobart on Friday.
At the close of a stop-start day through showers, the Windies were 207 for six with Bravo offering spirited resistance on 94 with Kemar Roach in support on 31.
Bravo and Roach kept the Windies innings ticking over with an unbeaten seventh-wicket stand of 91.
Lyon claimed two wickets in one over to trigger a middle-order collapse to have the West Indies in familiar trouble in their chase after a mammoth declaration of 583 for four on the second day.
The probing off-spinner snared the wickets of Marlon Samuels and Jermaine Blackwood in his seventh over along with opener Rajendra Chandrika for 175 Test wickets to leave the hapless Caribbean tourists struggling to avoid a heavy defeat with three days left.
The Windies sticky predicament was accentuated by the dismissal of skipper Jason Holder, the last of the recognised batsmen at the crease with Bravo.
Holder refused to seek a referral after being struck high on the pad by Peter Siddle and walked off for 15, leaving his side in deep strife at 116 for six.
Replays showed that the ball was missing the stumps and the towering Holder may have stayed on as the players left the field for a brief rain break.
The West Indies efforts were in sharp contrast to Australia’s run spree, propelled by a record 449-run fourth-wicket stand by Adam Voges and Shaun Marsh.
The West Australian pair eclipsed the fourth-wicket Test record of 437 set by Sri Lankans Thilan Samaraweera and Mahela Jayawardene against Pakistan in 2009.
It was also the biggest Test stand by Australians at home, bettering the 405-run fifth-wicket partnership by Sid Barnes and Don Bradman against England in Sydney in 1946.
But the duo fell two runs short of Australia’s all-time highest partnership for any wicket of 451 held by Bill Ponsford and Bradman against England at The Oval in 1934.
