When it happened for the first time, Virat Kohli just gave him a nod. When it happened again, he turned to Steve Smith and gave him a wry smile. When it happened a third time, he stepped back and gave a small shake of his head. Virat Kohli was stumped for the first time in his Test career when it happened for the fourth time.
And when Todd Murphy got past Kohli’s outside edge four times in their 11-ball match on the last day in Delhi, he beat his much more famous opponent by a large margin. When Kohli was done for the second time, he smiled, and it seemed like the superstar was telling the young challenger that he’d beaten him. So, when he finally got out of his crease, it seemed like the time had come for the star to set the rules. To show the young challenger that he is the boss, in other words. Instead, Murphy not only had the guts to throw another arm ball, but he also showed how world-class spinners have a knack for knowing what the batter will do next. It was a turning point in his career at the time. It also meant that Kohli was out for the second time in as many Tests. He would get him a third time in Indore, this time getting past Kohli’s inside edge. But it was this conversation with the best player in the world that really showed why everyone in Australia and the rest of the world is so excited about this glasses-wearing off-spinner from Echuca.
Kohli could be forgiven for coming into the series thinking that Nathan Lyon would be the hardest thing to get past. After all, the experienced off-spinner has got rid of him seven times in Test cricket. But Kohli isn’t one of the 19 people Lyon has bowled out in the three Tests so far. The person who has been standing between the former captain of India and that elusive big score has been the back-up. The kid who wasn’t even in Victoria’s starting XI at the beginning of the cricket season has become Kohli’s enemy.
In five innings, Murphy has thrown 99 balls at Kohli, who has scored 41 runs and been out three times. In fact, the master batter has only scored 8 runs and been out twice in the last 50 balls. Their first fight, in Nagpur, lasted 14 throws and ended in Murphy’s favor, which was lucky. Kohli then had his best innings of the series in the first innings in Delhi. He scored 44 runs, 27 of which came from 35 Murphy deliveries. In recent times, this was as close to Kohli’s best performance against spin as we’ve seen. Rahul Dravid said that Kohli’s performance calmed the team after another top-order collapse. On a pitch that kept the ball low, Kohli chose to play Murphy mostly off the backfoot with a vertical bat and rely on his eye to find any balls that didn’t behave as they should.
In keeping with the pattern of the series, the off-spinner attacked from around the wickets. But his lines were closer to the middle stump and turned more toward the batter. Kohli didn’t mind going deep into his crease to hide the ball or stretching out to hit full balls straight through mid-wicket.
Then came the second inning, which we already talked about, when Murphy turned this little battle in his favor. It happened right after Kohli got India’s small chase off to another confident start. This time, however, Murphy changed his plan of attack and went after the off-stump. It was a quick change of direction that showed how little Murphy knew. Murphy realized that by only trying to get the inside edge and LBW, he was playing to Kohli’s strengths. Any mistake in length gave Kohli’s Popeye arms a chance to tuck the ball through the covers or smash it through midwicket.
Murphy figured that if he could bring the ball back from off stump, it would give him more ways to get Kohli out and keep him from getting too far ahead. If it spins back toward the wicket, the LBW is on; if it stays on its line, the catchers behind the wicket are also in the game. Murphy threw Kohli 11 straight “no-balls,” and on the 11th, Kohli decided to step out of the batter’s box. Since Murphy could bowl in the early nineties (km/h) even when he had a small injury on his side, it was never going to be easy to step out to him. Kohli found out the hard way and was stumped after being beat in the air and on the outside edge.
If that one series wasn’t enough to show that Murphy had the upper hand, he did it again in Indore. Again, Kohli’s spin bowling was a mini-classic, but the rest of the top order fell apart around him on the first morning. Murphy never put Kohli behind the eight ball. Instead, he threw 16 balls in a row without getting a single run. This made the best batter have to reach forward to defend balls in the middle and off line. But if the one that went with the angle in Indore was Kohli’s downfall, the stock ball that turned back into him this time was. It went around his attempt to defend forward and hit him in the pads, right in line with the stumps.
And to think that Murphy was so nervous before his first ball to Kohli that he stood at the top of his mark.
“It’s been great. When he walked out to bat in Nagpur, I was kind of at the top of my game, thinking this is as good as it gets, getting to bowl to a guy like that. So to be able to have that for the first three Tests has been great. It’s been a really fun battle, and it’s no different than bowling to a lot of their guys. It can be scary for them to stand there.
“It’s always nice when it looks like that, and I think the plan for around the wicket is always to challenge both sides of the edges. It was nice that things worked out the way they did, and it was awesome to get him out again. Planned things are always nice. Nagpur wasn’t the best way to get out of the game, but you have to take what you can get. “To have a couple of times in the last few games has been great and shows that what we are doing is working,” he said.
The wood he seems to have over Kohli has only shown the Australian coaching staff what they already seemed to know, which is that in Murphy they have someone for both the present and the future.
“Steve Smith pointed out how well he did in the last Test. Nathan and Matt took all the wickets, but he said that his spell made it possible for everyone else to take wickets as well. And I think that string of balls he’s thrown at Kohli pretty much sums it up. And the fact that Kohli had never been caught out before that Test match in Delhi. So, as assistant coach Daniel Vettori put it, “I think Todd has the skill to be able to bowl either defensively or offensively, depending on what the game needs from him.”
Now, Murphy will have the chance to quiet the loudest crowd he has ever played in front of in Ahmedabad, when Kohli is at the crease. This is the fourth time in a row. And you know that the young spinner will be up for it.
