Cheteshwar Pujara feels that India should have batted well on Day 1 of the pink-ball Test and felt they were 70 to 80 runs behind in the end against Australia. After winning the toss and optig bat first, India got a big jolt as Yashasvi Jaiswal was dismissed for a first ball duck. However, Shubman Gill and KL Rahul put on a 69-run stand.
The game would then have a twist as India started to crumble as they went from 69 for 2 to 180 all-out in the end. Australia would end the day, trailing by 94 runs and with 86 on the board for the loss of 1 wicket. Speaking to the broadcasters, Pujara felt that India should have got 250 or 275 on the Adelaide track. The batter praised the Australia bowlers for their performance and felt that the Indian attack’s attempt to replicate them didn’t work out on Friday.
| AUS vs IND, 2nd Test Day 1: Highlights |
“I think we could have batted a lot better. It was a pitch where we should have got 250 to 275. So we are 70-80 runs behind. Credit goes to the Aussie bowlers because the way they bowled. They pitched the ball up. Their lengths were much better than our bowlers.”
“I do understand that our bowlers did try to hit the same length, which wasn’t the ideal length. âéBut if you look at the Aussie bowlers’ length, initially they mixed it up when there wasn’t help when they started pitching up,” said Pujara.
India kept on losing wickets
Pujara claimed that Australia were using back of the length deliveries well and the line was just over 4th stump. The batter said that India could have tried to get a few partnerships going but ended up losing wickets.
“They went to back of length. They started bowling betweem 6 to 8 meters and that’s where we lost a couple of wickets in the middle order. KL Rahul and Virat, both of them got out two back of the length deliveries. And the line was still just over 4th stump, which was an ideal line on this pitch.”
“So I found that I know we could have batted a lot better on this pitch, where we had partnerships, but after one partnership, we kept on losing wickets,” said Pujara.
The Indian batting would fail on the day with Rohit Sharma failing to make a mark.
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