Scott Boland relishing his battle against KL Rahul as Australia A set to field a formidable bowling attack for game 2.
Scott Boland is eyeing the chance to keep the pressure on KL Rahul after he flew in early to feature for India A.
Dhruv Jurel, the reserve wicketkeeper, and Rahul, who played the first Test match against New Zealand before being benched when Shubman Gill was fit, left India before the rest of the Test team to play against Australia A in order to get match experience.
If Rohit Sharma is unable to play due to personal reasons and Boland sees a chance to make an impression. Rahul, who averages just 20.77 in Australia from five Tests despite a century at the SCG in 2015, will be considered for the opening Test in Perth.
“I was lucky to bowl to him in a Test over in India a couple of years ago. But it’ll be nice to play against him in our backyard,” he said. “He’s a world-class player but someone I think we can get on top of pretty early and hopefully stay on top of him for the majority of the summer.”
Boland mentioned India’s 3-0 loss to New Zealand, like many other Australian players, but warned against extrapolating too much from it. Before the spinners grabbed control in Pune and Mumbai to achieve a renowned whitewash, the visiting quicks caused the damage in the first Test.
“There’s so much more bounce here, more seam,” Boland said. “The way they’ll structure their team will be completely different to what you see over in India.”
Boland is anticipated to be the Test team’s backup fast and is being prepared to play at some stage. It is thought that the big three’s successful completion of the home summer last season was a “outlier” and that other players will probably be required.
Boland, who averages 12.21 in home Test matches, has already acknowledged that he thought he would have a chance last season. But he was on the side by Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc, and Pat Cummins’ endurance. As well as the fact that none of the games lasted five days.
He has been recovering from an injury sustained early in the season when a heel issue forced the cancellation of a county deal with Durham. Last month, when playing New South Wales in the Sheffield Shield, he completed 28 overs. Boland said that he was subject to a “little bit of restriction” over the number of overs he could play in that match. With the same, he doesn’t anticipate being held back for Australia A.
“It felt like a long six months between games,” he said. “Remember being out on the ground in the Shield game and was just really happy to be back playing cricket. Haven’t had too many breaks for injury throughout my career so was different going through all the rehab.
“Luckily [we’ve] got really good physios and support staff at Cricket Victoria. So lucky I could lean on them, because few times I was like, ‘[are] any of these things getting better? But it’s all come good now and feeling really good.”