Steve Smith's Australians have already passed the test they anticipated in India. Playing from behind, under the relentless grind of attritional cricket, they have shown the requisite discipline, patience and resilience.
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Smith century helps Australia to 300
Steve Smith scored his twentieth Test hundred as the visitors were bowled out for 300 on day one of the fourth test.
They have been less successful when placed under the unexpected pressure of ascendancy. On the third day in Bangalore, the first day in Ranchi and now the first day in Dharamsala, Australia were caught off-balance by their own dominance. This, perhaps, had not figured as much as adversity in their plans. Bangalore's missed opportunity flipped into a dazed capitulation, Ranchi's set up a stirring rearguard action, and in the Himalayan foothills, the heights of a won toss, a true pitch and a dominant early position proved too dizzying to handle.
From the outset, this day had a different tenor from those that had preceded it. Three Test matches had produced cricket of screwed-down intensity on dry and deceptive surfaces. With balls rattling into pads and endless DRS referrals, the first three matches had been ball-by-ball dramas of millimetres. Here, in a day of wide open spaces, the video umpire could have gone out for a game of golf and not been missed. Dharamsala, making its Test debut, presented like the Perth of India: a clean-aired outpost of civilisation, a blue dome of sky, a faster wicket triggering faster cricket.
So stoical in the first three matches, the Australian top order perished to loose, free-wheeling shots. Matthew Renshaw and Peter Handscomb were bowled through the gate, Shaun Marsh flicked at a ball he would have scorned in Ranchi, and David Warner, wrestling to regain his batting rhythm, appeared to have won the battle until he was, like the Dalai Lama, caught embracing multiple perspectives and positions at once. An admirable philosophy for life, not so much for batting.
Team India, like the game being played, had a new look. Virat Kohli was wearing a drinks-waiter's vest, as unlikely a piece of casting as Omar Sharif playing a punkah wallah. In a daring selection, India replaced their premier batsman with a left-arm unorthodox bowler, Kuldeep Yadav, who was, like Dharamsala, on debut. The Australians had faced no wrist-spin all series, and Kuldeep was a many-sided revelation. His conjurer's action – ball hand tucked into his armpit while his free hand flung itself out to the side like a half-formed thought – produced bowling of unlikely accuracy and indecipherable variety.
![Matthew Wade brought up a half-century in the final session.](/web/20170328125435im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/v/6/i/g/h/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gv6iph.png/1490451561102.jpg)
Mentally geared for marathon chess games with R. Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja, the Australians were instead tricked into playing Chinese checkers with Kuldeep. India have not been known for springing surprises in cricket, and it is probably another sign of their increased confidence as the world's premier team that they dared rely on Kuldeep in a match with so much riding on it. He upset India's bowling team balance by sidelining a frustrated Jadeja, but he upset Australia even more, dismissing Warner with bounce, Handscomb with bite and Glenn Maxwell with a brilliant bosey.
Against this helter-skelter background, Smith's third hundred of the series was arguably his best. He, alone among the batsmen, adapted fully to the changed temper of the cricket. He found his flow early, stroking and sometimes smiting the fast bowlers through cover. Against spin, he was decisive whether going forward or back. Much of the personality focus in this series had been the mano-a-mano between Smith and Kohli. To see the visiting captain in command of his game, while the host was trying to rattle his cage from the sidelines, was to see one battle within the battle settled by knockout. Only perfection – say, an unplayable carom ball from Ashwin - could have dislodged Smith in this form, and that was what it took.
![World's best? Steve Smith.](/web/20170328125435im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/v/6/h/b/9/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gv6iph.png/1490689221098.jpg)
But for Australia, the excitement of having the upper hand gave them altitude sickness. At lunch, one wicket down for 131 runs, they could set their sights on 500 and the retention of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. By tea, that hope had turned to ashes and 300 looked barely attainable. But this would not be the 2017 series without another twist, and by the end of play, a doughty half-century from Matthew Wade, with some welcome support from the tail, would restore parity. Being underdogs again brought out the best in the Australians. It was almost as if they had to slip back into that position before they knew their game and could play the cricket they had come to play.