India’s Test specialist, Cheteshwar Pujara is preparing for the upcoming Test series against Australia at home.
While he has been doing regular practice, he has refused to reveal his tips on how he is preparing for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
Pujara has stated that he has played a couple of matches in the Ranji Trophy for Saurashtra and is also practicing at home.
I’ve played a couple of Ranji Trophy games as a part of the preparation for the series against Australia. Apart from that, I’ve been practicing back home at Rajkot. I can’t disclose particular things, but there are things which I’m working on a few points which will help me during this series.
For India, Pujara has been a vital player against Australia during the 2018-19 and 2020-21 Border-Gavaskar Trophies against Australia.
In the 2018-19 season, Pujara scored 521 runs and played 1258 balls and in the 2020-21 season, he followed that up with 271 runs from 298 balls.
Therefore, everyone will be eyeing the Saurashtra batter during this series as he was not part of the squad in the home Test series against Sri Lanka.
Pujara also played some county cricket for Sussex and made 1094 runs with an average of 109.40 from eight games.
After this, he was given a chance in the rescheduled fifth Test against England in Birmingham.
Pujara’s last Test scores have been 13, 66, 90, 102*, 24, and 6.
Pujara feels that his main competition comes from Nathan Lyon and Pat Cummins
Meanwhile, Pujara feels that his main competition comes from spinner Nathan Lyon and pacer and skipper, Pat Cummins.
However, he says that he has faced stiff competition from them in their home conditions.
Look, they’ve experience. They understand their strengths really well. Especially when we play them in Australia, they utilise the conditions well. They know which areas to bowl in, in those conditions. So I think the main battle against them in always in Australia. Not to forget that they are great bowlers and they’ve done well even in India, but my important battles against them have been in Australia. That’s something you need to do a lot of preparation for, as a batsman, you need to figure out your ways to counter them. As a batsman, you always enjoy that challenge.
Looking at previous meetings, then Pat Cummins has dismissed Pujara five times in the last series and a total of seven times in 10 games.
Meanwhile, Nathan Lyon has got the better of Pujara 10 times in 17 games. Pujara has been able to score only 521 runs with an average of 52.1 against the spinner.
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