Brisbane Test: Rain stalls play in third session of Day 3; India still trail Australia by 394 runs

At Stumps on Day 3, the visitors are struggling at 51/4 with right-hand batter KL Rahul (33*) and team skipper Rohit Sharma (0*) unbeaten at the crease.

The Rohit Sharma-led side resumed the third session from 48/4, trailing by 397 runs, with KL Rahul and skipper Rohit Sharma unbeaten with scores of 30 (52) and 0 (1), respectively.

Most of the third session was washed out as the rain continued to fall throughout the session. This third and final session of the day only witnessed three overs where the Indian side were able to score just three runs.

Earlier in the second session, the rain interrupted play, but Pant remained consistent in his approach of picking up runs on loose deliveries that fell in his hitting arc.

As Pant and Rahul started to gain momentum with the odds stacked against them, rain once again came in to stall play. The duo returned to the pitch once the rain let off.

Rahul arguably played the shot of the day with a cover drive straight out of the cricket textbooks off Cummins. With the scoreboard regularly ticking and the partnership becoming a threat to the Australians, Cummins upped the ante to extend the dominance exuded by the hosts.

The Australian skipper had worked out his angles and pitched the delivery beautifully to draw Pant (9) out. He nipped the ball away from Pant enough to catch the outside edge straight through to Carey.

Rahul tried to take the fight back by reeling off a four off Mitchell Starc, which turned out to be the final action in the second session.

In the first session of Day 3, a start-stop session utterly dominated by Australia, Indian players were once again asked to reflect on their flaws as the impending doom of defeat started to linger in Brisbane. It was A-Lister Jasprit Bumrah who paved the way for India by removing Mitchell Starc in the opening hour. Starc looked deadly the moment he smoked the ball into the stand with a picture-perfect slog-sweep off Ravindra Jadeja.

Bumrah sensed the threat radiating from the Starc and forced out an edge from the southpaw in the next over. Starc's feet were stuck on the ground as he attempted to push the ball away. A loose waft from the Australian was enough to pick up a nick as the ball travelled into the safe gloves of Rishabh Pant.With Alex Carey on the field, Nathan Lyon resisted the temptation to go after the Indian attack, as rain made its presence felt at irregular intervals.

With the tempo of the day set, Mohammed Siraj broke the shackles and managed to breach Lyon's defence to hit the middle stump.

With just a wicket left, Carey decided to charge at Akash Deep but ended up mistiming his shot, forcing Australia to wrap up its inning on 445.

In reply, Indian batters continued to live through the nightmares inflicted in Adelaide, with Starc being the driving force of the Australian pace attack.

His first victim of the day was Yashasvi Jaiswal, a player he has developed a rivalry with since the Perth Test. The young Indian southpaw managed to avoid a golden duck by edging the ball to the boundary, but Starc retaliated by swinging the ball and using the scrambled seam delivery to its effective use.

He picked up Jaiswal's wicket on his second ball of the match after the Indian chipped it away straight into Mitchell Marsh's hands. Shubman Gill (1) was next to return cheaply after he edged it away to Marsh, who took a flight and snaffled it with both hands.

Virat Kohli (3) soon joined the duo's company after being tempted by Hazlewood to chase the outside off delivery and edge it away towards the wicketkeeper.

Brief Score: Australia 445 (Travis Head 152, Steven Smith 151; Jasprit Bumrah 6-76) vs India 51/4 (KL Rahul 33*; Mitchell Starc 2-25). (ANI)