INDIA'S TOUR OF SOUTH AFRICA, 2018

India get a taste of Highveld's pace and bounce

by Kaushik Rangarajan • Last updated on

"Confidence doesn't dent after one match. Learn from the mistake you made and go forward." © AFP

Centurion's SuperSport Park is green. The outfield is lush and beyond the ropes, the grass banks form upto 70 per cent of the stadium's seating capacity. So by sheer relativity, the pitch's distinctively brown colour tone (with just a smattering of live grass) stands out. But this is the Highveld, so pace and bounce are anyway resident members here. If India, by chance, had it mixed up for a dose of South African hospitality, the practice wickets at the back of the ground knocked any such feelings away.

Virat Kohli nicked three balls in succession bowled by Ishant Sharma, Hardik Pandya and a junior Titans cricketer respectively. He admonished himself with a yell and set about a course correction of shot options. However, the annoyance of those three deliveries lingered on for the remainder of his first batting stint as he struggled for fluency. When done, he stepped out of the nets and engaged in a long conversation with Ravi Shastri.

The discussion seemed more centered around the point of leaving. In the second innings at Cape Town, Kohli marked his guard and then another point 1.5 meters in front of him on the pitch to account for his forward press. It was from there he would leave the balls. The pace on the practice wicket and Ishant's disconcerting bounce was leaving him short of time to leave confidently. Others who spent significant time in the fast bowlers' net - KL Rahul, Cheteshwar Pujara and Rohit Sharma - didn't look overly comfortable themselves. Kohli opted for another bout of throwdowns from 18 yards out and then stepped back into the nets for a second session. He was markedly better at leaving without an exaggerated forward press.

Jasprit Bumrah, who joined this bowling group belatedly after an early batting stint, took a while to find his range on the pitch. Much like in Cape Town, where the debutant served a slew of full-length deliveries to Faf du Plessis and AB de Villiers, he hit his stride in the nets rather belatedly. Right at the close of the session, he bowled a couple of quick lifters to Shikhar Dhawan and Ajinkya Rahane - the last of the specialist batsmen to play in the bowlers' nets.

In a press conference shortly after the session, the young fast bowler said that his preparations would not be defined by "perceptions" of the wicket but more by his adaptability. "You know that sometimes the wicket over here is bouncy but as soon as you play the first match, you see it's a flat wicket and then you have to adapt accordingly. So this is my basic plan always - never go by perceptions that this will happen and this won't happen. Nowadays, anything can happen anywhere. So my basic plan is, go inside and have a feel of the wicket and changes should be made accordingly."

Bumrah, a quick learner, conceded that he had erred by bowling too full in the first innings at Cape Town in search of swing. He was rewarded with three wickets in the second when he pulled his lengths back, including that of du Plessis who was dismissed by a snorter that evoked memories of Sreesanth to Kallis from Durban 2010. "In the first innings we thought we bowled a little fuller than the normal because in India the wickets are different where we have to pitch fuller to get the swing and to get the batsmen on the front foot.

"Over here there is bounce, there is a little bit of difference. We analysed that and tried to adapt that in the second innings and as a unit we were able to create pressure, so that was the basic plan going into the second innings. We were trying to create pressure from both ends and focus on our lengths which were wrong in the first innings. We just tried to correct them and not overdo things because over here, when there is help from the wicket, you try to do extra but that won't help. So we were just trying to be disciplined and stick to basics. That worked well. So hopefully, we will see videos of these wickets, what happens over here and we plan according to it."

Despite his four-wicket haul, which included getting AB de Villiers twice, Bumrah is under no illusion that he enjoyed a dream debut. At the same time, he isn't one to concede that his confidence could have been dented following an expensive (economy 3.84 in the first innings) start in the Cape Town low-scorer. "It is not a dream debut. What ever I learnt from first match, I was happy as a bowler. As a bowler you look to get his first wicket as early as possible and I got AB. It was happy, and from there on we took lot more wickets. Not to get too excited and not to get too down after every match is my motto and take the confidence into the next match.

"Confidence doesn't dent after one match. If it happens, then you don't deserve to play. Learn from the mistake you made and go forward. There is not a single cricketer who has not made a mistake. You keep learning and you keep improving all the time. We are trying to rectify our mistakes and move forward."

© Cricbuzz

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