Australia reward Cummins' caution to claim Melbourne thriller

MELBOURNE : Criticised for waiting to unleash his bowlers at India, Australia captain Pat Cummins was ultimately rewarded as they engineered one of the best wins of his career on a tepid Melbourne Cricket Ground pitch on day five.

Australia took seven wickets after tea on Monday to claim an astonishing 184-run win in the fourth test in front of a huge crowd and forge a 2-1 series lead with the final match in Sydney to come.

Cummins defied former players, pundits and plenty of fans who had wanted him to declare Australia's second innings closed on day four, thereby allowing his bowlers to hunt quick wickets after tea.

Instead, tailenders Nathan Lyon and Scott Boland marched out to bat early on Monday and raised India's victory target to a record 340 runs.

It looked inevitable the match would peter out into a draw as India openers Rohit Sharma and Yashasvi Jaiswal held onto their wickets through the first hour.

But Cummins had other ideas, producing a two-wicket burst to remove opposing skipper Rohit for nine and KL Rahul for a duck, before Mitchell Starc dismissed Virat Kohli for five.

Jaiswal and Rishabh Pant looked to have steered the tourists to safety by batting through the entire middle session but India crumbled after tea.

Cummins was named Player of the Match for taking six wickets and scoring 100 tail-end runs in front of the biggest aggregate crowd for a test match in Australia.

Little wonder he rated the match so highly among his wins.

"I'm just trying to work out where it sits, I reckon that's right at the top," he said.

"Edgbaston was pretty special and I reckon that's pretty much on par, that was amazing.

"When you take all that into account, it's probably the best test match I've been involved in, in terms of 80,000