![\"Sourav](\"https:\/\/indiansportsnews.co.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/Sourav-Ganguly.jpg\")
Kolkata: Former India skipper Sourav Ganguly reckoned that injured left-arm quick Mitchell Starc’s absence in the third Test against Australia which ended in a draw at Ranchi on Monday, resulted in the off-spinners from either side — Ravichandran Ashwin and Nathan Lyon — failing to find much purchase from the Jharkhand State Cricket Association (JSCA) Stadium track.<\/p>\n
Ganguly felt that both the off-spinners failed to find the rough outside the off-stump which is often created by the left-arm bowlers.<\/p>\n
India’s Ashwin in his two innings returned figures of 2\/185 bowling a combined 64 overs, while Australia’ Lyon — wrecker-in-chief in the first Test in Pune where he claimed career-best figures of 8\/50 — got just the wicket of a tired Cheteshwar Pujara in the first innings after the latter played the innings of his life, a classical 202 off 525 deliveries.<\/p>\n
“Off-spinners did not get wickets here. This is because Mitchell Starc was not there, so the rough outside off-stump was not created,” Ganguly told reporters.<\/p>\n
Starc — Australia’s prime bowler — was ruled out of the tour after playing the first two Tests due to a stress fracture in his right foot.<\/p>\n
The third Test ended in a draw after the Australian pair of Shaun Marsh and Peter Handscomb stitched together a match-saving 124-run stand for the fifth wicket in their second innings.<\/p>\n
Replying to their first essay total of 451, India rode the brilliance of Pujara and stumper Wriddhiman Saha (117) to a mammoth 603\/9 declared after taking a lead of 152.<\/p>\n
“They (Marsh and Handscomb) played really well,” Ganguly said.<\/p>\n
Ganguly did not want to read too much into Ashwin’s low returns in this tie.<\/p>\n
“He got wickets in the last match only.”<\/p>\n
Ashwin returned with a match haul of 8\/125 in the second Test played in Bengaluru. The fourth and final rubber will be played in Dharamsala from Saturday with the series evenly poised at 1-1.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Kolkata: Former India skipper Sourav Ganguly reckoned that injured left-arm quick Mitchell Starc’s absence in the third Test against Australia which ended in a draw at Ranchi on Monday, resulted in the off-spinners from either side — Ravichandran Ashwin and Nathan Lyon — failing to find much purchase from the Jharkhand State Cricket Association (JSCA) Stadium track.<\/p>\n
Ganguly felt that both the off-spinners failed to find the rough outside the off-stump which is often created by the left-arm bowlers.<\/p>\n
India’s Ashwin in his two innings returned figures of 2\/185 bowling a combined 64 overs, while Australia’ Lyon — wrecker-in-chief in the first Test in Pune where he claimed career-best figures of 8\/50 — got just the wicket of a tired Cheteshwar Pujara in the first innings after the latter played the innings of his life, a classical 202 off 525 deliveries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[4744,6693,466,21758,1175,1949,1130,544],"class_list":["post-33980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket-cricket","tag-cricket-news","tag-india-vs-australia","tag-indian-sports-news","tag-jharkhand-state-cricket-association","tag-mitchell-starc","tag-nathan-lyon","tag-ravichandran-ashwin","tag-sourav-ganguly"],"yoast_head":"\n