While their four-match home Test series against the no.1 Test ranked team India is just going to begin, Australian pacer Josh Hazlewood spoke about the Indian batting line-up and Virat Kohli.
The 27-year-old right-arm Australian pacer feels that India has one of the best batting line-ups in the world but it mostly depended on the top-ranked Test and ODI batsman Virat Kohli.
Recently, Hazlewood said, “I see the Indian line-up as the best in the world, if not right up there, led by Virat and I think they feed a lot off him and how he goes about things. They’ve played a lot at home since we played them last in Australia. They toured England and South Africa, and it was only Virat who stood out. A lot of the other [batsmen] haven’t scored too many of the runs.”
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The first Test will be played at Adelaide from this Thursday (December 6). Before that opening Test of the series, Hazlewood claimed that they will surely discuss how to handle Kohli in this Test series.
Hazlewood said, “I think we’ll obviously have a chat about him before the game starts. We’ll come up with a couple of options. It’s about what conditions suit, with a player of that calibre you need a few options.”
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Hazlewood further added that the sledging doesn’t work for the batsmen like Virat Kohli.
He added, “Virat obviously thrives on that sort of stuff. It gets him going and he probably plays his best cricket when he’s doing that. It’s up to the individual — if it’s a bowler or a fielder. I am usually pretty quiet when I am bowling.”
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Talking about their game plan for the first Test, Hazlewood pointed out the early breakthroughs will be crucial for the game.
The right-arm pacer quoted, “If we can make some early inroads in this first Test, it’s always crucial and the first innings. If we can get on top of them early, hopefully that will filter through the rest of the Test.”
Many experts have put the visitors India into the favourite side for the upcoming Test series, due to Australia is going to miss their two top-class batsmen Steven Smith and David Warner. However, Hazlewood doesn’t agree with this fact as he believes that it’s pretty even due to having a strong bowling line-up in their squad.
Hazlewood said, “I think it’s pretty even. They’re obviously [the] No. 1 Test team in the world but we play some good cricket at home. So I think it’s very even heading this.
“With our bowling attack we are very confident and based on last year, we had quite a good template there and it worked pretty well (in the Ashes). So we’ll be looking to replicate that and test it against one of the best batting orders in the world.”
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Hazlewood also spoke about the importance of the off-spinner Nathan Lyon as he claimed that Lyon is the key for him.
The pacer claimed, “He’s the key for me. With the four of us, you have Pat who bowls shorter spells and sometimes [Mitchell] Starc, too. So to have Lyon, it even worked well two weeks ago when we played the Shield game. He pretty much bowled from one end after the new ball and we filtered through from the other end.”
