Former India player and head coach Ravi Shastri said that he would have liked the Indian team to play at least one full-fledged warm-up contest on Australian soil before the Border-Gavaskar series. Team India opted against any practice matches against any domestic side and instead, they went for match simulation in Perth as well. However, India will play a warm-up match against the Prime Minister’s XI to adjust to the pink ball during the gap between the first and the second Tests of the series as well.

“It’s always, ‘how strong will the opposition be?’ That’s the first question you ask (planning a tour game). I prefer playing matches, even if it’s a two-day game or a three-day game. With the time India had, they might have thought of that, but at the end of the day, it’s the team management who understands best,” Shastri said (via The West Australian).

“They know how tired the players are – they’ve just come off a series against New Zealand, they’ve played some one-day cricket as well, so they thought this was the best preparation … time will tell,” Shastri again added.

However, Virat Kohli has inevitably been the focus of the series even before the first match, with the Australian media coverage giving their resources and space to hype up as this could be his last tour Down Under as well.

“You mellow with age, don’t you? But I think at the start of the Test series, you might just see (Kohli) firing again. He needs to be, I’d like to see him (like that) again. In the face, that’s Kohli. Come Australia, he’ll get his juices going. It’s (about) how he starts off, and for Australia, it’s with Steve Smith. These guys, don’t write them off – because if they get cracking in the first two or three innings, they’ll have a good series,” Ravi Shastri concluded.