India vs Australia, MCG Test: Captain Virat Kohli lauds Ajinkya Rahane and band for dominating day one

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Melbourne, December 26: He may not be part of the side and leading the Indian Cricket Team in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, but Virat Kohli lauded his team for putting up a dominant show over Australia on day one of the second Test.

In Kohli's absence, Team India is being led by Ajinkya Rahane - who performed his duties as a captain as well as a fielder brilliantly - bundled the Australian side to 195 in their first innings of the Boxing Day Test.

Impressed with his team's performance Kohli took to his Twitter handle and lauded his fellow teammate for their domination. "Top day 1 for us. Great display from the bowlers and a solid finish too," tweeted Kohli.

Rahane made good field placements and rotated his bowlers brilliantly, helping the tourists to restrict under 200 runs in the first innings. Rahane gave enough freedom to senior spinner R Ashwin and strike pacer Jasprit Bumrah as they wreaked havoc on the Australian batting order. Bumrah grabbed a four-for while Ashwin returned with three wickets to his name.

Debutant Mohammad Siraj also shined with the ball as he picked up a couple of wickets at crucial junctures which helped the visitors keep a leash on the flow of runs for the Aussies. They even kept picking up wickets at regular intervals and prevented the hosts from coming back in the game.

Later, debutant Shubman Gill remained unbeaten on 28 while Cheteshwar Pujara (7 not out) saw the Indian innings through in the last hour of the day's play. India lost their opener, Mayank Agarwal, for a duck in the first innings. But Gill along with Pujara looked to revive the Indian innings and prevented the fall of any more wickets till the umpires signal the end of the day's play.