Melbourne [Australia], December 4 : Former England captain Michael Vaughan said that the Australian team lacked aggression during their loss to a "dangerous" India at Perth during the first Border-Gavaskar Trophy Test and their batting is nowhere near what it used to be during their peak years.
As Australia prepares for the second Test at Adelaide Oval, a pink-ball, day-night affair, they would no doubt be bothered heavily by the 295-run loss that transpired at Perth. The star-studded, glorious Australian batting line-up was exposed big time, especially Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne.
Also, the centuries by Yashasvi Jaiswal and Virat Kohli were among many batting highlights in the second innings that left Aussie players exhausted mentally and physically by the time they stepped on the pitch to chase a gigantic 534 runs.
Vaughan, who had the experience of competing against legends like Ricky Ponting, Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath, Brett Lee, Adam Gilchrist etc during his playing days during the fiercely-contested Ashes series, noted that India gets extremely dangerous once they start feeling confident and it was visible in Perth as their body language and playing style was aggressive and in-your-face. On the other hand, Australia just looked like a "nice team to play against."
"India are a very dangerous side, particularly when they start to get confidence and I think we saw that in Perth," Vaughan told SEN.
"They have got that energy and that aggressive nature, and that is the one thing that surprised me in Perth. I know India was on top, but India looked like a more aggressive team and a little bit more in-your-face in terms of playing cricket the way that Australia used to play."
"Australia just looked like a team that was just going - not through the motions - but they just looked like a nice team to play against."
"I did not see any aggression. I did not see the bouncer theory coming to Yashasvi Jaiswal. I did not see any kind of confrontation out in the middle," he concluded.
Vaughan also said that maybe the Aussies missed out on the presence of retired batter David Warner, who brought a lot of energy and aggression through both his batting and on-field confrontations, sledging and banter.
The former England captain also said that it is Australian batting which is letting them down more as compared to their bowling as the Pat Cummins-led quartet of Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Nathan Lyon still can get top sides bowled out.
"I think the bowling attack is without any question that quartet of bowlers are up there with the best, but the batting is nowhere near," Vaughan said.
"I think that is where teams can really target this Australian batting lineup. If you can bowl them out quickly, which India did in that first Test, the bowlers have to go back out there and bowl a little bit too soon because they've not had the rest.
"The only way that Australia can put it right is by winning, and that is very simple terms. The batters can only put it right by putting a number on the board, your job as a bat is to score runs, your currency is runs. But it would not be easy," he concluded.
Vaughan could very well be right in his observation, with Mitchell Marsh (44.61) and Usman Khawaja (38.20) being the only batters averaging in late 30s or 40s since the team's ICC World Test Championship title win against India last year. Premier batters like Smith (32.82), Labuschagne (27.41) and Travis Head (30.45) have been facing a lean patch.
The Adelaide Test, starting on December 6, sees India entering with both a mental and physical edge, following a dominant performance in the first Test led by Jasprit Bumrah's bowling and captaincy.
However, the visitors will also aim to exorcise the memories of the infamous 2020 Adelaide pink-ball Test, where they were dismissed for their lowest Test score of 36 runs. On that occasion, Pat Cummins (4/21) and Josh Hazlewood (5/8) dismantled the Indian batting line-up, giving Australia a straightforward target of 90 runs to chase.
Australia squad (for second Test): Pat Cummins (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey (wk), Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Josh Inglis, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitch Marsh, Nathan McSweeney, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Beau Webster
India squad: Rohit Sharma (C), Jasprit Bumrah (VC), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Devdutt Padikkal, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Rishabh Pant, Sarfaraz Khan, Dhruv Jurel, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Siraj, Akash Deep, Prasidh Krishna, Harshit Rana, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Washington Sundar.

Reserves: Mukesh Kumar, Navdeep Saini, Khaleel Ahmed, Yash Dayal.