Twin tons lead Australia to 3-365

It was David Warner’s day but Matthew Renshaw’s destiny as Australia’s opening pair posted starkly contrasting centuries that broke records and raised hopes.

Warner grabbed the spotlight with an innings of rare presence and sublime skill, but it was the second act from his young side kick that underpinned their team’s tally of 3-365 at day’s end.

Quick Single: Warner creates history with century before lunch

Completing their most dominant opening day of a Test in more than a year, since they piled on 3-438 against a hapless West Indies line-up at Hobart on December, 2015.

And ensuring that the opening pair that Australia take into their subsequent Test assignment – the four-Test tour to India next month to tackle the world’s best team – offers the best possible combination for such a daunting task.

The fast-scoring, bowler demoralising effect of Warner (113 from 95 balls) that will be crucial to quelling India’s soaring self-belief as well as their exultant fans, and the steady surety of Renshaw (167 not out at stumps) whose bat is as imposing as his young frame.

Quick Single: Old fashioned ton for Aussie youngster

With the very real prospect tomorrow of Renshaw becoming the youngest Australian batter – and only the third player aged less than 21 in the game’s long history – to notch a Test double hundred.

While Warner’s feat in scoring a century prior to lunch on day one of a Test had never before been witnessed in Australia, it was not a total bolt from the blue who had witnessed previous efforts from the opener.

Like the blazing start to that first Test against India in Adelaide two summers ago when Warner, fuelled by the still raw hurt of Phillip Hughes’s death, surged to 50 from 45 balls in barely an hour before throttling back to reach a ton not long after lunch.

But the primary difference today was Warner’s total control and complete mastery of an attack that he clearly felt posed no threat in light of the scars he had inflicted upon them in Melbourne a week earlier.

Quick Single: Warner's record knock by the numbers

And the complementary fact that despite that obvious supremacy, the left-hander felt no need to push his luck and instead batted with ominous restraint that signalled he has entered a frighteningly prolific new phase of his cricket development.

By contrast, Renshaw is in the very earliest stages of his Australia career having not yet completed his inaugural international summer.

A tenure that will stretch for some time if the evidence tendered over his first three-and-a-half Test matches provides a template for the future.

Renshaw is everything Warner is not, yet their union might just come to parallel – even surpass – the previously unlikely Test opening combinations that the current vice-captain forged with the stolidly solid Chris Rogers (with whom he averaged 51.33 for the first wicket) and Joe Burns (44.32).

Renshaw is as watchful as Warner is vengeful.

Quick Single: A tale of two centuries

All lumbering limbs compared to Warner’s fast-twitch energy.

And as outwardly unfazed by his regular stints of scorelesness at the crease as Warner is on edge if he’s not added to his tally for an over, or less.

Where they align is an innate understanding of their own individual games.

Warner's is, and has always been, to push the game forward although in recent years that overt aggression has been tempered with a commitment to consistency that now places him alongside India’s Virat Kohli as the most prized wicket in the Test game.

Renshaw’s is built on an unerring confidence that his method is as sound as his defence, and that if he places sufficient value upon his wicket and minimises risk at every turn, hefty scores will invariably follow.

As it did today, when at 20 years and 281 days he became the youngest Australia batsman since Hughes (aged 20 years, 96 days in South Africa seven years ago) to score a Test century.

And the youngest to achieve the feat on home turf since 19-year-old Doug Walters plundered 155 against England at the Gabba 50 years ago.

Not that it came without incident, having begun with a distinct lack thereof.

A start so cautious as to render him almost invisible against the glare of Warner’s audacity slowly gave way to a performance that came to define, if not dominate the day.

The confident left-hander scored just 25 in the first session, but then upped the pace as Pakistan’s attack became as tired as they had been uninspired and added 58 between lunch and tea.

During which time he outscored the more experienced Usman Khawaja (13) in their 52-run partnership that ended when Khawaja flashed languidly at Wahab Riaz.

And then matched it with his captain Steve Smith, who silenced the crowd of more than 30,000 for one of the few times during a lopsided day when he nicked off for 24.

That was when Renshaw was on 91 and eyeing his milestone, and in the next over – without addition to his score – he was struck a frightening blow when he failed to negotiate a bouncer from Mohammed Amir.

A ball that skidded more than it ballooned, and followed Renshaw as he tried to sway then duck out of its path only for the ball to smash into the metal grille of his protective helmet.

Leaving it to resemble the roll cage of a crashed race car.

The Queenslander was treated for several minutes on the field while a replacement helmet was ferried out, and he was asked a series of questions by Bupa Support Team Doctor Peter Brukner to clear him of concussion fears before he resumed his innings.

But five overs later it was resounding, jubilant applause ringing in his ears as he tucked legspinner Yasir Shah on the leg side, was called through for a single by his batting partner Peter Handscomb and swung a heavy right uppercut at the air in celebration.

Renshaw then underscored the prevailing wisdom that it’s his temperament as much as his talent that has carried him so quickly to Test level, by immediately knuckling down and converting a maiden century into a score beyond 150.

Asserting the dominance Australia had claimed from the day’s very first over.

Or perhaps earlier.

Pakistan defied predictions of a dual spin attack in line with Australia’s selection strategy, and instead plumped for seamer Imran Khan to replace labouring quick Sohail Khan.

A move that delivered immediate results, although not the kind that the tourists had envisaged.

Imran was nothing short – and regularly too wide – of fodder for Warner, whose breakthrough century in Melbourne the previous week had instilled in him a sense of destiny to accompany his ever-present dash.

The opener helped himself to a couple of boundaries against some lukewarm bowling that was barely Test standard, as Imran conceded 11 runs from his opening over then a further 12 from this third.

Interspersed by an incongruous maiden, only because he was bowling at the habitually circumspect Renshaw who would have been left in Warner’s wake had he been able to inch that close to his batting partner.

The incandescence of Warner’s batting could not completely flare out the inadequacies in pretty much every element of Pakistan’s performance, which looked to be suffering from post-traumatic shock after their MCG calamity.

The tourists didn’t practice for two days after that defeat, their only pre-Test training run being a perfunctory outing on Monday afternoon and it showed when they hit the ground stumbling today.

Listless, undisciplined bowling was further undermined by lazy fielding and the absence (attributed formally to a 'niggle' in his left leg by team officials) from the bowling crease during the middle session of their strike bowler, Amir.

He returned to rattle Renshaw and take the second new ball late in the day, but by that stage Pakistan had abjectly let slide the fight they had so bravely brought to the first Test in Brisbane and the first three days in Melbourne.

A distant memory now.