Bowlers stole the show on the first day of play in the 2025 World Test Championship (WTC) final as Australia were bowled out for just 212 runs after South Africa won the toss and chose to bowl first. However, the Proteas' innings also got off to a disastrous start as they lost two quick wickets.

Quite intrestingly, the number 1 batter (by batting order) of both teams got out for a duck. Usman Khawaja batted 20 balls but failed to open the scoring before Kagiso Rabada dismissed him in the 7th over of the match. Later in the day, Aiden Markram was dismissed in the first over by Mitchell Starc after facing six balls.

The 2025 WTC final is the 561st Test match being played in England, a country which first hosted an international game in the longest format in 1880, but this marks the first instance of the number 1 batter of both teams being dismissed for a duck in the first innings of the match.

Overall, this is the 10th instance of this happening in Test cricket, with six of them involving Australia including the last four. Starc has taken the wicket of the batter on three of these occasions.

The first instance of the same happening was in 1977 between Australia and India at MCG meaning the rare feat never took place in the first 100 years of Test cricket being played.

Number 1 batter Of Both teams Dismissed For duck In First Innings Of A Test Match

Player 1	Player 2	Match	Venue	Year
Sunil Gavaskar	John Dyson	Australia vs India	Melbourne	1977
Kris Srikkanth	Gordon Greenidge	India vs West Indies	Delhi	1987
Gary Kirsten	Matthew Hayden	South Africa vs Australia	Gqerberha	1997
Adrian Griffith	Neil Johsnon	West Indies vs Zimbabwe	Port of Spain	2000
Hannan Sarkar	Dwayne Smith	West Indies vs Bangladesh	St. Lucia	2004
Alastair Cook	Stiaan Van Zyl	South Africa vs England	Durban	2015
Dimuth Karunaratne	Joe Burns	Sri Lanka vs Australia	Galle	2016
Joe Burns	Mayank Agarwal	Australia vs India	Melbourne	2020
David Warner	Rory Burns	Australia vs England	Hobart	2022
Usman Khawaja	Aiden Markram	Australia vs South Africa	Lord's	2025

Talking about the match, Steve Smith (66) and Beau Webster (72) scored half-centuries while Kagiso Rabada took a five-wicket haul.

Starc dismissed both South African openers as Ryan Rickelton (16) departed shortly after Markram, while Pat Cummins dismissed Wiaan Mulder, while Josh Hazlewood got the wicket of Tristan Stubbs. The Proteas ended the day at 43-4.

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