Natarajan gives Mitchell Starc taste of his own medicine with brilliant yorker

T Natarajan is indeed making the most of the Australian conditions with his splendid bowling performance. The yorker specialist had got an opportunity to don the Indian jersey during the dead-rubber third ODI on Wednesday. He had finished with figures of 2/70 from his 10 overs by accounting for Marnus Labuschagne and Ashton Agar. Meanwhile, Natarajan also made the ball do the talking during his maiden T20I outing on Friday.

Natarajan gives Starc a taste of his own medicine

The 29-year-old was on a roll in the 1st T20I against Australia at the Manuka Oval, Canberra. It was his brilliant yorker to remove tail-ender Mitchell Starc that had stood out the most during his spell. Starc, who has the ability to bowl yorkers at will was at the receiving end this time around. 

This happened in the penultimate over of Australia's run chase. On the very first delivery, the Tamil Nadu cricketer bowled one on the off and middle stump line as the southpaw looked to play an aggressive shot by leaving all the three stumps exposed. He ends up missing the ball completely as his left-arm counterpart has the last laugh by disturbing his furniture. 

It was a dream debut for Natarajan in the shortest format as he finished with figures of 3/30 from his four overs at an economy rate of 7.50. Before cleaning up Starc, the Salem-based quickie had picked up the crucial wickets of opener D'Arcy Short and explosive middle-order batsman Glenn Maxwell.

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India draw first blood

India posted a challenging total of 161/7 in their 20 overs after being asked to bat by the Australian skipper Aaron Finch riding on a stellar middle-order contribution from Ravi Jadeja who scored an unbeaten 23-ball 44 at a strike rate of 191.3.

In reply, the hosts got off to a flying start as Finch and D'Arcy Short added 56 runs for the opening stand before the former departed. The Aussies then lost wickets at regular intervals as Smith and Glenn Maxwell were dismissed early. Short (34) and all-rounder Moises Henriques (30) tried their level best to keep Australia in the hunt, but once they fell, the tail-enders could not offer much resistance as they were eventually restricted to 150/7 as Kohli & Co. registered a 11-run win to draw first blood in the three-match series.

(Image Courtesy: BCCI)

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