India vs Australia: Day 1 Highlights of 4th Test Match 

The much-awaited boxing day test match of the Border Gavaskar trophy finally got started today; day one was full of drama, performance and aggression. We will unfold every aspect of the Day 1 game.

Playing XI

Australia had already announced it's playing 11 a day before with the changes of bringing young 19-year-old Sam Konstas replacing Nathan McSweeney and Bringing Scott Boland as Josh Hazelwood’s replacement, who is facing an issue with his hamstring. While the Indian side made one change, bringing Washington Sundar in the place of Shubman Gill, it's also been expected that Rohit Sharma will once again open the innings in the Boxing Day test. While we can't confirm it yet, Abhishek Nayar's team’s batting coach reportedly said, "Rohit will be opening for us".

Australia's playing XI

Australia Playing XI:

• Usman Khawaja
• Sam Konstas
• Marnus Labuschagne
• Steve Smith
• Travis Head
• Mitchell Marsh
• Alex Carey (wk)
• Pat Cummins (c)
• Mitchell Starc
• Nathan Lyon
• Scott Boland

India playing XI

• Yashasvi Jaiswal
• Rohit Sharma (c)
• KL Rahul
• Virat Kohli
• Rishabh Pant (wk)
• Ravindra Jadeja
• Nitish Kumar Reddy
• Washington Sundar
• Akash Deep
• Jasprit Bumrah
• Mohammed Siraj

Australia’s Rock Solid Batting

After winning the toss for the first time in the series, Australia decided to bat first. Young Sam Konstas and Usman Khwaja opened the innings. Sam impressed everybody with his aggressive batting, which ranged from hitting risk shots to taking Jaspreet Bumrah on his hands. Konstas scored 60 runs off 65 balls. 

Australia's top 4 batters, Konstas, Khawaja, Labuschagne and Smith, all scored half-centuries and played a big role in building a good foundation for Australia's batting,

Sam Konstas's Dream debut

A 19-year-old boy got his first international test call that too directly on the Boxing Day Test match against India. Konstas' fearlessness was visible when he played the first ball of the match, and on his 10th ball of the innings, he tried to scoop on Jaspreet Bumrah’s ball. The stadium was amazed at his shot, which clearly sent out the message about how he would bat. Later, he hit two sixes on Jaspreet Bumrah's bowling on the same shot he missed earlier. Sam scored 60 runs on his debut innings in the first, with six boundaries and two sixes behind the stumps.

A bit of audacity!

Smiles everywhere as the 19-year-old Sam Konstas attempted to ramp Jasprit Bumrah very early in his debut 👀#AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/9I9urUnmuq

— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) December 25, 2024

The Face-Off between the Konstas and Kohli 

The match also became controversial when debutant Sam Konstas was in the middle of the pitch, and Virat Kohli accidentally hit him with his shoulder. This situation created an unpleasant atmosphere on the ground, and Australia's fans started a trolling campaign against Virat Kohli. Later in the day, the ICC took action against Virat Kohli for violating the ICC code of conduct and fined him 20% of his match fee and one demerit point.

"Have a look where Virat walks. Virat's walked one whole pitch over to his right and instigated that confrontation. No doubt in my mind whatsoever."

- Ricky Ponting #AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/zm4rjG4X9A

— 7Cricket (@7Cricket) December 26, 2024

India finally made a comeback in the last session of the day, taking four wickets of the Australian batters. It was a kind of collapse when India took three wickets(Khwaja, Labuschagne and Travis Head)in just 24 balls. Jaspreet Bumrah took three wickets, while Jadeja, Siraj and Akashdeep took one wicket each. On day 2 of the boxing day test match, Steve Smith and Pat Cummins will come back again to bat while India will look to finish their innings as early as possible.