Boxing Day Test: Australia vs India fourth Test prediction and cricket betting tips

Where to watch Australia vs India

TNT Sports 1, 11.30pm Wednesday (Christmas night)

Best bets

India highest first-innings individual score to be under 91.5
3pts 5-6 bet365

Alex Carey top Australia first-innings runscorer 
1pt 9-1 Betfair, Paddy Power

Australia vs India fourth Test prediction

Australia and India's five-match series is level at 1-1 after rain helped the tourists claim a battling draw in the third Test in Brisbane.

The forecast is set fair for the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne, where India shocked the Aussies on their way to 2-1 series victories in 2018-19 and 2020-21.

The tourists made the perfect start to the series with a 295-run drubbing of Australia in Perth but their batting frailties have been exposed in the last two matches.

India were rolled over for 180 and 175 in the day-night Test in Adelaide and needed some lusty late hitting from number 11 Akash Deep to avoid the follow-on at the Gabba last time out.

Australia have dropped opener Nathan McSweeney so teenager Sam Konstas, who has played only 11 first-class matches, is set for a daunting debut clash with India's ace fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah.

The home pace attack is likely to feature Scott Boland, who took 6-7 against England at the MCG three years ago, and backing India's highest individual first-innings score to be under 91.5 appeals.

Opener Yashasvi Jaiswal has been dismissed for nought, nought and four in the first innings of the first three Tests while Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill and Rishabh Pant are also short of runs.

India's top first-innings individual scores in this series have been 41, 42 and 84 and the highest score made by a visiting batsman in Australia's last three Melbourne Tests, against England, South Africa and Pakistan, was just 65.

Bumrah has kept India in the series with some breathtaking spells of fast bowling and he arrives in Melbourne with 21 wickets at an average of 10.9.

His threat with the new ball suggests Australia wicketkeeper Alex Carey may be worth backing to top-score in the first innings, having made his maiden Test century against South Africa in the 2022 Boxing Day Test.

Carey's unbeaten 98 sealed March's tense victory over New Zealand in Christchurch and, after a prolific start to the Sheffield Shield campaign for South Australia, he looked in good touch when scoring 70 and 20 not out in the Brisbane Test.

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