‘Ability to deal with failures key’
India skipper hints his most experienced pacer and young opener Prithvi Shaw will start in Basin Reserve Test
WELLINGTON: India captain Virat Kohli hinted on Wednesday that seniormost pacer Ishant Sharma and young opener Prithvi Shaw will be in the playing XI for the first Test against New Zealand starting here on Friday.
If India’s net session on Wednesday is taken into consideration, Wriddhiman Saha should stay wicketkeeper, and be selected ahead of Rishabh Pant for the series opener at the Basin Reserve. Hanuma Vihari, the designated No. 6 batsman for away Tests, will be the fifth bowling option with Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Shami Ishant the pacers.
R Ashwin is in the mix for the lone spinner’s spot though Ravindra Jadeja’s all-round skills can’t be ignored.
Ishant, who was out for three weeks following an ankle injury suffered while bowling in a Ranji Trophy game, bowled full tilt at the nets, earning appreciation for troubling batsmen with pace and bounce.
“He (Ishant) looked pretty normal and pretty similar to what he was bowling before the ankle injury. He is hitting good areas again and he has played (Test cricket) in New Zealand a couple of times (in 2009 and 2014), so his experience will be useful to us. It was really good to see him bowl with pace and in good areas,” Kohli said in his media interaction.
The skipper also indicated that the team wouldn’t like to change Shaw’s natural strokeplay, which was a strong hint that uncapped Shubman Gill will have to warm the bench for now.
“Prithvi is a talented player and he has his own game and we want him to follow his instincts and play the way he does. Look, these guys have no baggage and are not desperate to perform in any manner,” he said.
‘SHAW SHOULD LEARN FROM MAYANK’
Kohli wants Shaw to take a leaf out of opener Mayank Agarwal’s performance in Australia in 2018-19, when he hit back to back half-centuries in Melbourne and Sydney. “They don’t have any nerves to do well overseas. Like a clear head with which Mayank played in Australia, Prithvi can do the same in New Zealand.
“A bunch of guys playing with fearlessness, something that can motivate the whole team, gives us a start that the team wants and not get intimidated by the position in any way.”
He downplayed India’s below-par show in the threematch ODI series, especially that of Agarwal. India lost the series 0-3.
“Prithvi, I think you can call him relatively inexperienced, and Mayank, I wouldn’t call him that inexperienced because he has scored a lot of runs last year. So he understands what his game is like in Test cricket.
“Sometimes in white-ball cricket we try to do too much, but once you come into red-ball cricket, you fall into that disciplined mode of batting, which obviously suits him much more at this stage.”
While he didn’t give an answer on the Saha-pant debate, the young Delhi keeper had precious little to do at the main nets and was seen spending more time doing his keeping drills. He only got an opportunity to bat when the first team completed its routines.
ALL-PACE ATTACK
New Zealand are likely to pick an all-pace attack but Kohli wants to stick to his team’s strengths which is playing one spinner in a four-pronged bowling attack.
“If it had been a Johannesburg pitch, I could have said it’s a possibility (playing four pacers) but our team has that skill that we can bowl out other teams with only three fast bowlers.
“But you need one world class skilful spinner, who can take wickets on any pitch. We won’t copy the home team. We would rather figure out what is the most lethal combination, which gives us balance,” he added.
“As a bowling group it’s better than the one that came to NZ last time and that is why we have got so many teams all out in the last two-and-half years. We would like to repeat that here also,” Kohli added.
WELLINGTON: Negative experiences can shape a person’s character making him more resilient, says New Zealand batsman Ross Taylor ahead of his record-breaking 100th Test.
Taylor will become the first cricketer to play 100 games in each of the three formats. Taylor, who is less than three weeks away from his 36th birthday, has already played 231 ODIS and 100 T20 Internationals.
On the eve of his milestone, does Taylor look back at those early days? “Yeah, I think so. That shapes you as a person and as a player,” the former New Zealand skipper agrees.
“Sometimes it’s not necessarily the runs you get and the good times. It’s how you deal with failures along the way that shape you as a person, as the way you go about your training, as a teammate. Sometimes it’s the negative things that make you harder and stronger and more resilient, and that’s what you need to be a Test player,” said Taylor.
PUSHED BACK
Had the Christchurch Test against Bangladesh not been cancelled due to terror attack at the mosque in March last year, the Sydney Test in the previous series would have been his 100th Test. However, he can’t be happier to play the big game in front of family and friends.
“David White (NZC CEO) comes in and gives us a talk about what games are coming up and you start doing the math and he actually says ‘Ross, it’s going to be your 100th Test in Sydney’. But obviously what happened in Christchurch last year with the shootings at the mosque had moved things back a game.
“But then, things happen for a reason, I believe, and it’s nice for it to happen back home. I don’t know how many people would have travelled to Sydney for it. So it’s nice for it to be here.”
He got messages from former teammates Daniel Vettori and Brendon Mccullum. “I just got a call from Brendon before we got here saying all the best. He said ‘do better than what I did’. I don’t know what he got in his 100th game. I asked if there was any tip on how to deal with tickets and things like that,” he laughed. “I got a message from Vettori last night. It’s a special club to join and nice to hear from players who have been there and done that.”