Kohli, Dhoni epics level series for India

It was India's dynamic duo – yet another ODI century from maestro Virat Kohli and an unbeaten 55 from past master MS Dhoni – who powered their team's mighty run chase and ensured the three match Gillette ODI Series against Australia will be decided at the MCG on Friday.

In stifling heat that had peaked above 41C and saw both India stars in need of aid during the course of their defining innings, India mounted the second-highest successful ODI run chase that the Adelaide Oval has witnessed.

The winning run arrived almost as an anti-climax, a scampered single coming as it did a delivery after Dhoni had clubbed Jason Behrendorff beyond the mid-on fence to tie the scores.

It was a blow that echoed Dhoni's famous hit of similar style, if greater resonance, that secured India's 2011 World Cup win in Mumbai.

It also came as the 37-year-old battled cramps and heat distress in the final stages of India's epic pursuit that took them to a target that Australia had surely felt was sufficient, and with four balls to spare.

While it was Dhoni whose name the crowd chanted at game's end, the greater grunt work was undertaken by Kohli who further enhanced his already peerless reputation for batting in run chases.

To place Kohli's latest deed in its pure context, he now has more than twice the number of ODI centuries posted by ex-West Indies great Brian Lara – widely regarded as the other modern batting great alongside Sachin Tendulkar – from 81 fewer matches.

He is also just 10 centuries adrift of Tendulkar's high watermark of 49 ODI tons, having played 218 times for India compared to the Little Master's 463.

Remarkably, 24 of those centuries have come when India has batted second and in the past two years Kohli's average in ODI run chases is more than 94 per innings.

But as he was within sight of leading his team to an historic triumph, Kohli was forced from the field for what appeared to be a comfort break and – within four deliveries of returning after a hiatus of around five minutes – he holed out to deep mid-wicket for 104.

Which left the onus for victory upon Dhoni, his predecessor as India captain and the other raucous favourite of the volubly partisan crowd of 22,454, who roared with euphoria when the penultimate strike cleared the rope to announce Dhoni's 69th ODI half-century.

The batting prowess of the star duo under the comparative cool of evening ultimately outshone Shaun Marsh's heroic innings compiled in the brutal heat of the day.

Marsh's 131 (from 123 balls faced) was his second-highest score in 62 ODI appearances, bettered only by the 151 he pummelled against a hapless Scottish attack at Edinburgh in 2013.

More pertinently, given Australia's top-order batting has proved unreliable with their World Cup defence six months away, the 35-year-old has now posted four of the past five ODI hundreds by an Australia batter.

The fifth coming from skipper Aaron Finch in June last year, before his batting form took a wretched turn.

Marsh was compelled to make a cautious start against tight India bowling, and in light of another wasteful start that saw the host team reduced to 2-26 in the eighth over.

Dropped from the Test squad last week, the left-hander showed his limited-overs form has rarely been in better shape as he reached 50 from 62 deliveries around the mid-point of the innings, at which stage Australia was 3-116 and seemed unlikely to threaten a 300 total.

However, it was on the strength of a 94-run stand in a tick over 10 overs with Glenn Maxwell (48 from 37 balls) that sparked the reigning world champions' innings to life.

But just as Australia dared to dream of a tally in excess of 320, a benchmark that would have required an unprecedented run chase by India at Adelaide Oval, both batters fell in the same over which triggered a late-order collapse of 4-3 within 10 balls.

As it was, the 50-over total of 9-298 (crowned by Nathan Lyon's huge six from the ultimate delivery) meant India needed the largest successful ODI run chase since Sri Lanka's 303 in a memorably spiteful match against England 20 years ago.

The visitors began their pursuit with a flurry, as openers Rohit Sharma (43 from 52 balls) and Shikhar Dhawan (32 from 28) laid the foundation upon which Kohli rapidly built.

The rate at which India went after Australia's new-ball bowlers was starkly at odds with the manner in which the home team began their innings, an effort that once again found itself faltering from the start.

The batting woes that have come to afflict Aaron Finch were best articulated by the strangled shout he let loose when Bhuvneshwar Kumar clattered his stumps in the seventh over.

It was the familiarity of the outcome as much as the exasperation at another insubstantial score that led Australia's limited-overs captain to throw back his head and emit a guttural roar.

It was the 13th occasion across 22 international innings over the past year – a dozen ODIs and five Test matches – that Finch has been either bowled or pinned lbw.

His vulnerability to those modes of dismissal has heightened since making his Test debut against Pakistan in the UAE last October, with the right-hander averaging less than five runs per innings against bowlers targeting his stumps in that time.

From the outset today, it was clearly the plan of India's seamers to zero-in on this area of perceived weakness and the usually free-scoring Finch was restrained accordingly.

The six runs he compiled from 19 deliveries faced included not a single boundary as he furiously defended his stumps, until Kumar pitched a delivery slightly fuller and found a faint inside edge before clipping the wicket.

Four deliveries later, Finch's opening partner and vice-captain Alex Carey also fell in looking to manufacture a scoring shot against some tight new-ball bowling with his ambitious attempted pull yielding a top-edged fly ball that went no further than mid-wicket.

The 56-run partnership that Marsh then fashioned with Usman Khawaja was ended by a flash of brilliance, when Ravindra Jadeja swooped on the ball from backward point and hurled down the bowlers' end stumps with Khawaja centimetres short of his ground.

But Marsh was increasingly finding his stride as the pitch quickened up in the baking heat and hitting through the line of the ball became a less risky pastime.

The left-hander added a further 52 with Peter Handscomb (20 off 22) and 55 with Marcus Stoinis (29 off 36) before he teamed with Maxwell for Australia's most productive and most proactive partnership of the innings.

As Marsh found his range and cleared the short leg-side boundaries with brute strength, and Maxwell aired the creativity that has led his myriad supporters to champion a move up the batting order from his current number seven.

Not that Maxwell's 48 was without missteps.

In addition to the few plays and misses in the final stretch as he tried to heave the bowling with all the strength he could muster, he was adjudged lbw on 26 to give seamer Mohammed Siraj – making his international debut – his maiden ODI wicket.

His celebration, however, lasted only until Maxwell belatedly signalled for the decision to be reviewed, a process that showed the ball to be missing leg stump and Siraj's milestone moment erased from history's record.

He briefly thought he had broken through a few overs later when Maxwell's lofted drive met the outstretched right hand of Rohit at extra cover, but his inability to reel in the chance at the second attempt meant Siraj remained wicketless.

And finished his inaugural 10-over spell with the second-most expensive ODI debut figures by an India bowler, although Karsan Ghavri's 0-83 (albeit from 11 overs) at the first World Cup in 1975.

Gillette ODI Series v India

Australia ODI squad: Aaron Finch (c), Jason Behrendorff, Alex Carey (wk), Peter Handscomb, Usman Khawaja, Nathan Lyon, Mitch Marsh, Shaun Marsh, Glenn Maxwell, Jhye Richardson, Peter Siddle, Billy Stanlake, Marcus Stoinis, Ashton Turner, Adam Zampa

India ODI squad: Virat Kohli (c), Rohit Sharma (vc), Shikhar Dhawan, Ambati Rayudu, Dinesh Karthik, Kedar Jadhav, MS Dhoni (wk), Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Ravindra Jadeja, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Khaleel Ahmed, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj

First ODI: Australia won by 34 runs

Second ODI: India win by six wickets

Third ODI: January 18, MCG (D/N)