Aussies' historic task made tougher by Kohli's comeback

The prospect of Australia having to overturn almost 60 years of precedent to wrest back the Border-Gavaskar Trophy has become even more challenging with the resurgence of one of their most potent rivals.

While the result of the first Test at Perth Stadium remains unknown, only a fantasy writer would dare float a script whereby Australia recovers from their overnight 3-12 to reel in the distant victory target of 533.

And given they have lost wickets at a rate of roughly one every eight so far in the NRMA Insurance Series opener, the chances of batting out the remaining two days and surviving a further 180 overs of Jasprit Bumrah-led onslaught would seem similarly far-fetched.

Even the ever-pragmatic Josh Hazlewood, the pick of Australia's bowlers with 1-28 from 21 unrelenting overs today, conceded his focus had already turned to preparing plans for India's rampant top-order batters in the next Test at Adelaide Oval starting December 6.

Principal in that preparation will be strategies to contain former India captain Virat Kohli whose fondness for Australia and posting scores while here saw him bounce back from a rare lull in his Test career to complete a century that will further embolden his dominant team.

When Kohli went to the wicket just one delivery after today's lunch break, to lock horns with Hazlewood who held a near-new ball in his hand, Kohli carried with him the burden of a worrying form slump.

Considered the combative embodiment of India's re-invention of a powerhouse when playing away as well as at home, Kohli's output has been diminishing over recent years.

Since his memorable 186 in a bat-dominated match at the cavernous new stadium at Ahmedabad in March last year, the 36-year-old's sole century was 121 against West Indies at Trinidad four months later.

During that run of 19 innings prior to today's knock, Kohli had reached 50 just three times with 10 of those visits to the crease yielding scores of 20 or less and six of those being single figures.

The latter cohort included his first innings of the current Test when he fell victim to Hazlewood's additional bounce and edged a straightforward catch to slip having scored five.

But despite coming up against the same bowler and an even newer ball today – he was in the middle after 11 overs on Friday, while the second new ball was barely four overs old today – his returns and his approach could not have been more different.

Of potentially greater consequence, Kohli's even hundred today lifted his already buoyant teammates and reinstated the belief that the warrior brings out his best in the heat of Border-Gavaskar Trophy battles.

Apart from the previous tour to Australia in which he played just the first Test before returning home for the birth of his and wife Anushka's first child, he can boast hundreds on each of the prior visits here across the past 13 years.

"I think when he came out he looked positive," Hazlewood said after today's play in Perth.

"He probably left (the ball) a bit better in the second innings early on.

"Then I think the game situation dictated how he needed to play.

"He needed to get on with it a bit, so that India could have bowl at us tonight.

"That probably forced his hand a little bit, which can take the pressure off sometimes and we saw almost a one-day innings from him – manipulating the field, manipulating the bowlers and that sort of stuff.

'He looked in pretty good touch this afternoon."

When Kohli departed the Australia campaign four years ago when captain, his team had been hammered in the opening Test at Adelaide (where they were bowled out for 36) before staging a remarkable comeback to win the series 2-1.

Should Australia find themselves in the same predicament by suffering a heavy defeat tomorrow or Tuesday, they will need to delve much further into history to find a precedent.

The last time Australia came back after losing the first Test of a series at home to emerge triumphant overall was the 1968-69 tour by West Indies when they lost the opener at the Gabba by 125 runs before emerging 3-1 victors in a five-Test campaign.

The only other time they've achieved the feat in the past 100 years was the famous Ashes turnaround of 1936-37 when a two-nil deficit after losses in Brisbane and Sydney became a 3-2 triumph.

But at no stage in either of those summers was the home team set a fourth innings target as insurmountable as the 534 they stared at upon starting their second innings today.

To avoid defeat, Australia will need to find not only their highest-ever fourth innings Test score on home soil which is currently the 7-381 they managed to force a draw against New Zealand at the WACA Ground in 2001-02.

Cummins' men also need to substantially better the previous best fourth-innings tally posted by all comers in Australia – Pakistan's heroic 450 in their unsuccessful pursuit of 490 at the Gabba in 2016.

It will therefore require some significant work by Australia between the end of this Test and the start of the next day-night encounter less than two weeks hence to arrest India's Kohli-led momentum and build some of their own.

Hazlewood admitted the task in Perth was essentially beyond Australia's grasp, especially after rookie opener Nathan McSweeney (0), nightwatcher Pat Cummins (2) and Marnus Labuschagne (3) were fired out within 4.2 overs of carnage tonight.

But he noted there was some important goals they needed to aim for over the next day or two.

"You probably have to ask one of the batters that question," Hazlewood said when quizzed on how Australia might approach their gargantuan assignment.

"I'm relaxing and trying to get a bit of physio and a bit of treatment (and) probably looking mostly towards next Test and what plans we can do against these batters.

"I think it's just the (remaining Australia) batters sticking to their plans tomorrow and batting some time.

"It's obviously a long series, it's a five-match series and if we can put some overs into their (India's) top quicks that's a couple of goals we need to tick off tomorrow.

"And if a couple of guys find some form and score an 80, a 90 or even a hundred that's probably the positives we can take out of it.

"They (India) are obviously well in front of this one and they're doing the damage."

NRMA Insurance Men's Test Series v India

First Test: November 22-26: Perth Stadium, 1.20pm AEDT

Second Test: December 6-10: Adelaide Oval, 3pm AEDT (D/N)

Third Test: December 14-18: The Gabba, Brisbane, 11.20am AEDT

Fourth Test: December 26-30: MCG, Melbourne, 10.30am AEDT

Fifth Test: January 3-7: SCG, Sydney, 10.30am AEDT

Australia squad: (first Test only) 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

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