Perth. With brilliant centuries from Yashasvi Jaiswal (161) and Virat Kohli (100 not out), India declared its second innings at 487 for 6 after the tea break on the third day of the first Test against Australia at the Perth Stadium here on Sunday and the hosts A very difficult target of 534 runs was set before the team, chasing which the host team lost 3 wickets for 12 runs in 4.2 overs.
Indian captain Jasprit Bumrah sent two of these players to the pavilion. Bumrah dismissed Nathan McSweeney for zero and Marnus Labuschagne was out LBW for 3 runs. Mohammed Siraj got Australian captain Pat Cummins, who came as a nightwatchman, caught by Virat Kohli at slip for 2 runs. Australia still needs 522 runs to win, while it has seven wickets left.
Earlier, as soon as Virat completed his century by hitting a sweep four off Marnus Labuschagne, captain Jasprit Bumrah declared the innings. On the other end, Nitish Kumar Reddy returned to the pavilion unbeaten after scoring 38 runs in 27 balls. Virat hit 8 fours and 2 sixes in his century innings of 143 balls. Whereas, Nitish hit 3 fours and 2 sixes.
With this century, Virat equaled Sunil Gavaskar's record of scoring maximum 7 centuries in a foreign country. Apart from this, he also equaled Sachin Tendulkar's record of scoring 9 centuries against one country. Tendulkar has 9 centuries against Sri Lanka and 11 centuries against Australia. Gavaskar holds the record of scoring 13 centuries against West Indies. This is Virat Kohli's 30th century and he has gone ahead of Australia's Don Bradman's 29 centuries.
India had lost three wickets for eight runs in the space of 18 balls after a strong position of 313 runs for two wickets, but Virat made 89 runs for the sixth wicket with Washington Sundar and 77 runs for the seventh wicket with Nitish Kumar Reddy. By sharing runs, India's total lead crossed 500.
Earlier, Yashasvi Jaiswal, playing ahead of his Saturday score of 90, was out after playing a marathon inning of 161 runs with the help of 15 fours and 3 sixes in 297 balls. The second unbeaten batsman KL Rahul scored 77 runs. India started playing yesterday with a score of 172 runs without losing any wicket.
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Image Credit: KhasKhabar.