For a dozen years and 18 series, they all came to India with hope more than conviction, perhaps, but with the avowed desire to burst the bubble of invincibility that India wore like an indestructible cloak. Some came close, others were put in their place, their temerity punished mercilessly. Every time their hegemony was questioned, primarily by England and Australia, India pushed back with renewed vigour, stung to the quick that they could even be challenged in their own backyard.

It took New Zealand just seven playing days to effect the most dramatic and unexpected of blows to India’s home dominance.

Before Saturday and the 113-run defeat in Pune, one had to go all the way back to December 2012 for the last instance of India losing two successive Tests at home. That was against Alastair Cook’s England, who bounced back from defeat in Ahmedabad to triumph in Mumbai and Kolkata on their way to a famous 2-1 victory. India responded with their first sweep of Australia, 4-0, in March 2013; that was to set off a celebrated glory run which flattened every challenge, real or imagined, feeble or otherwise, with metronomic regularity.

Steve Smith’s Australia believed they were on to a good thing when they won the first Test in 2017; India ended up winning the four-match series 2-1. During the Covid-19 pandemic, England had the gall in February 2021 to grab a 1-0 advantage after the first of two Tests in Chennai; Joe Root’s men were decimated, 3-1 to India.

At the start of this year, Ollie Pope fired a shot for Bazball with a counter-punching (or is it sweeping?) second-innings 196 that helped England overturn a 190-run deficit and snatch a 1-0 lead in Hyderabad. Five weeks later, Ben Stokes and his men were licking their wounds after a chastening 4-1 hammering. The message was clear – Don’t you dare poke the bear.

Daring New Zealand stun and shock India

New Zealand dared. First, they poked, and then they poked again. And again and again, with typical New Zealand efficiency, characteristically unassuming, with a smile rather than a snarl, with grace instead of ugliness. Few gave them a ghost of a chance before Bengaluru. They had just been beaten out of sight in a two-Test series in Sri Lanka, they were without their best batter of all time, Kane Williamson. They hadn’t won a Test in India since November 1988. They had a new full-time captain once Tim Southee resigned after the Sri Lankan misadventure. Lip-smacking time in the Indian camp? You bet.

But wait, New Zealand have never been pushovers. They might be tired of being reminded that they often punch above their weight; they might even think that is disrespectful. When they are a model of consistency in ICC events, making the knockouts without fail, who is anyone to determine what their weight is? But they are very good at internalising, these Kiwis. They are ambitious but also smart; they are industrious but also enterprising. They are popular tourists. In private, even the Indian team might tell you that if someone had to end their streak, which was inevitable at some stage or the other, they are glad it is Tom Latham’s New Zealand.

The Kiwis came with a simple plan – to fire the first shot, as Latham mentioned a zillion times after the series was secured in Pune. That meant snatching the early initiative, doing the initial running, shaking off the timidity of the past that had gotten them nowhere and instead trying to put the Indians under pressure. If that didn’t pay off, so be it – at least they wouldn’t die wondering.

Latham lost a toss that, had he won, could have come with disastrous consequences in Bengaluru because, like Rohit Sharma, he too had wanted to bat first. He won a toss that, had he lost, could have been decisive in Pune because the advantage was always going to be with the team batting first. But New Zealand aren’t sitting on a 2-0 lead because of the toss alone. They have been skillful and feisty, they have asked questions of India not for an over or an hour or a session but for days together. For once – for the first time in a dozen years, let’s not forget – India couldn’t respond in kind. They were schooled in Kiwi-like conditions in Bengaluru, which can happen, but they were also mastered in the most Indian of conditions in Pune. That combination has proved awesome for one team, awful for another.

By going where more celebrated overseas teams haven’t before, New Zealand have exposed India’s Achilles’ heel. How will the rest of the field react? More importantly, how will India, humbled and embarrassed, themselves react?

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