Pat Cummins’ calm disposition is refreshing to see. Under pressure or not, the Australia captain appears relaxed and easy whenever fronting up to face the media.
After an innings defeat in the first Test in Nagpur, his team quickly needs to find a strategy to adequately deal with the threat posed by spinners – in particular R. Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja.
Cummins admitted the difficulty of the task ahead but was optimistic of a comeback ahead of the second Test in Delhi.
Cummins said batters might have to take more risks than they do in Australia while batting to succeed in these conditions.
There is then a better chance of unsettling the opposition and not allowing them to implement their plans. “No stress” if the strategy fails.
“I think it’s about failing the right way. These conditions are tough. But [it could be that] that is our best chance by taking the game on with someone taking a calculated risk. If it doesn’t come off that’s totally fine. No stress,” he said.
But with regard to the playing style itself, there won’t be any attempt to tweak the individual styles.
“We are really big on each player having their individual method. So for some people, it’s sweeping and that’s worked really well. Steve Smith is probably our best batter in these conditions. He’s got a big swing for the ball. So they each have their own. Just the full confidence that whatever they find, just be brave enough to take it on,” he said.
Cummins continued to repose faith in David Warner, who fell for low scores in both innings in the first Test.
“You saw this year at the Boxing Day Test when he puts pressure back on the opposition he’s pretty hard to bowl to. You don’t get as many good balls. He knows that; I’m sure that’ll be part of his planning, he has been batting really well here, even in lead up he was fantastic. I know there’s a lot of talk about kind of spin bowling through the middle but with the new ball it is sometimes the hardest time to bat as well against spin.”
The inclusion of Cameron Green in the lineup frees up the team to include three spinners. Green, however, may not have sufficiently recovered from his finger injury picked up last month. It was yet uncertain whether he would be fit enough to take the field at the Arun Jaitley stadium here on Friday.
“I think having a right-hander helps and I think providing a right-handed fifth bowling option also helps. He is a big player and he’s certainly helped the team function well from batting and bowling. You’ve got to be able to perform well as well. He’s still coming back from injuries. I think he only had a couple of sessions where he’s kind of catching with a hard ball so we’ll see [whether he can be included in the lineup], again he had a really good session yesterday so let’s see how it pulls up,” Cummins stated.
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