‘Transition’ nonsense can’t be reason for home Test loss, says an irate Pujara as he blames technique and shot selection.
‘I don’t buy this’ – Pujara won’t accept transition as excuse for losing Tests at home.
Cheteshwar Pujara won’t let India’s Test cricket transition be an excuse for a home Test defeat.
Pujara questioned the Indian batsmen’ strategy on a field that featured uneven bounce and turn from day one after India lost their first Test match to South Africa, falling to 93 all out in the last innings. However, he also stated that the batters were not solely to fault.
“I don’t buy this that India are losing at home because of transition. I can’t digest that,” Pujara said on JioStar after India lost by 30 runs in Kolkata. “If you lose in England or Australia because of transition, it could be acceptable. But this team has the talent and potential. You look at the first-class record of all the players – Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Shubman Gill… Washy [Washington Sundar] batted at No. 3 in this game – all their records are so good. Still if you lose at home that means something is wrong.
“If you had played the same match on a good wicket, there were much better chances of [India] winning. How do you define Test cricket? On what kind of a wicket are your chances better of winning? On such tracks, your chances decrease and the opposition is at par with you. There’s so much talent in India, even an India A side could beat South Africa. So if you say this loss is because of transition, it’s not acceptable.”
Gautam Gambhir, the head coach of India, emphasised that it was “exactly the pitch we were looking for” after the game, in which 189 was the best innings total and only one half-century was recorded, mostly because of the sharp turn, up-and-down bounce, and rough patches that made batting difficult.
Although India has frequently favoured rank turners to obtain their home edge, their selection of such a track in the wake of last year’s 3-0 home loss to New Zealand and now this defeat—their fourth in the previous six home Tests—has raised concerns.
“You can’t just blame the batters on this kind of a wicket because firstly if you want to play on such wickets, your preparation has to be different,” Pujara said. “Gauti bhai said they asked for this kind of a wicket but it wasn’t easy to bat on. Look at the stats of both teams – only one batter scored a fifty so it shows it wasn’t a good wicket.
“If you want to play on such tracks, your batters have to be prepared accordingly and it didn’t look like they were prepared. On such wickets, you have to play different kind of shots, like rely more on sweeps, play a little positive, try to move the scoreboard. But there was an expectation that this wicket would be a bit decent, it would have some turn, and you can bat well and score runs. But this wicket wasn’t like that. If the Indian team wants such turning wickets where the ball turns from ball one, then the batters’ approach will have to be different.”