Tonight, when many of us finally make our way home, we will all still be wondering, “Just what the hell happened today?”

It was that kind of day. Kohli had assured us that his team would be better. This wicket was not like Pune. Heck, we even won the toss. Then, we suddenly just couldn’t get the car moving. We were stuck – to many in the Indian team, it must have felt like quicksand. The more they struggled, the deeper they seemed to sink.

We tried different approaches too – Cheteshwar Pujara attempted to wear out the bowlers, Karun Nair tried to attack, Ajinkya Rahane tried a little of both and Kohli tried to leave them alone (pun intended). Only KL Rahul succeeded but largely because he seemed to be at peace with himself.

Still, you can’t help but wonder how the best team in the world (India are World No 1 in the ICC Rankings) has been reduced to such a blundering mess. Perhaps no statistic is as damning as this: India have been dismissed for less than 200 runs in 3 consecutive innings at home for the first time in 40 years.

So what’s really going wrong? Let’s try and take a look:

Opening troubles

India’s average opening partnership during this home season has been a measly 29.21. It didn’t hit us badly against the lesser teams but against Australia, early wickets have meant that Pujara and Kohli are in to bat when the bowlers are fresh. It also means that the visitors have never quite felt like they are under the gun. We have never been able to pile on the pressure… never been able to make them chase leather. Rahul has been good against Australia but the combination as a whole hasn’t worked.

Here’s a look at India’s opening stands during the home season:

Vs New Zealand

  • Kanpur: 42-1, 52-1  
  • Kolkata: 1-1, 12-1  
  • Indore: 26-1, 34-1  

Vs England

  • Rajkot: 68-1, 0-1  
  • Visakhapatnam: 6-1, 16-1
  • Mohali: 39-1, 7-1
  • Mumbai: 39-1
  • Chennai: 152-1 (when Parthiv Patel opened)

Vs Bangladesh

  • Hyderabad: 2-1, 12-1  

Vs Australia

  • Pune: 26-1, 10-1
  • Bangalore: 11-1

Quality spin on turners

The pitches haven’t been great. That much we can all agree on. But still, the Australian spinners have looked better than their Indian counterparts and that is saying a lot. Ravinchandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja are ranked No 1 and No 2 in Tests. Nathan Lyon is highly regarded but he doesn’t even make the top 10. Steve O’Keefe, in the eyes of many, was lucky to even get picked for this tour. Yet, Australia’s spinners have done the simple things right – they have stuck to their guns, believed in their plan and delivered the wickets. They have also kept things extremely tight. As Lyon said after his amazing 8-50: “I watched a lot of Ashwin but I’ve got to stick to my strengths too. I have played a lot of Test cricket as well.”

A ‘Test’ approach is also a testing one

One of the biggest Tests for the Indian batsmen was going to be how they would respond to runs drying up. The Aussie attack was tailored for this approach: Hazlewood is known to be very accurate and O’Keefe was picked to shut things down from one end too. That left Starc and Lyon free to attack with abandon.

India needed to adapt to this change of approach. Australia are playing on the patience of the Indian batsmen… they are preying on the inexperience of the batsmen. It was the kind of thing you expect a wily veteran like Darren Lehmann to come up with but it was also the kind of thing you expect a wily veteran like Anil Kumble to counter. India’s batsmen have looked confused in the middle, they haven’t been able to make up their mind… should they attack, should they defend. The result is that they have been caught in no man’s land and often that path has led back to the pavilion.

An opposition that prepared

Coming into the series, Australia had not won a Test on the subcontinent since 2011. They had not won in India since 2004. Both statistics mean nothing now. But that is exactly why they made their way to the ICC Academy in Dubai to train on pitches made from Pakistani soil. Once there, they trained and they trained. They got used to the heat and Lyon bowled around 1200 balls during their time in Dubai to get into match mode. It was very much the kind of advice that Kapil Dev loves doling out: “The best practice for a bowler is bowling.” Each player had a specific schedule to follow. And the approach has clearly worked for them. It continues in India too. O’Keefe came out at bowled during lunch in the Pune Test after he had an ‘ordinary’ first session. Lyon bowled for an hour before the first session in Bengaluru. The batsmen spend time in the nets batting without the pads so that they start using their bat to play and not the pads. This is not to say that India has not prepared but Australia has certainly gone the extra mile and nothing beats good preparation.

Too long a season?

It can never be easy to keep the intensity going over a long season and whether you like it or not, Test cricket requires you to spend time in the middle – it takes something out of you with every match. One might argue that despite the best intentions, the Indians are just not able to will their bodies to put out the best effort. It’s just a thought but at the fag end of the home season, the bodies have already been through a lot. Even if they were winning, it was taking a toll, a toll that seems to become a millstone around the neck when you start losing. Virat Kohli spent much of the time after the Pune Test convincing himself that the batting breakdown was an aberration. But that’s what India told itself after the stunning losses against England in 2011. Sometimes, it might be okay to say that we did get things wrong… sometimes it might be okay to refocus and begin again. Given the hole that India has managed to dig itself into, things really can’t get much worse and a new approach can only help. If there was ever a definition for rock bottom, this is it.

India’s bowlers will have a chance to effect a turnaround tomorrow but for that they will need to hold on to every chance and starve the opposition for runs. Then and only then, India might see light at the end of what seems like a really long tunnel right now.