India Wk-batter Rishabh Pant said that he batted with restraint on day 01 of the first test of the Border Gavaskar Trophy. He said that the SCG pitch did not allow him to be in his aggressive self.
Rishabh Pant has been copped with criticism for his batting approach during the ongoing test series against Australia. He made a 98-ball 40 runs in India’s 185 runs all out at Sydney.
“In this innings, I wasn’t in the frame of mind where I felt I could take charge of the game looking at the nature of the wicket,” Pant said in the post-day press meet.
“Sometimes you have to play secure cricket as there were occasions where I could have taken 50-50 chances but didn’t,” he added.
The left handed wk-batter said he is evolving as a batter and trying to balance his style and approach between defence and aggression.
A six so big the ground staff needed a ladder to retrieve it!#AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/oLUSw196l3
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) January 3, 2025
“You want to bat the way that comes naturally to you but keep evolving and trying to keep a balance between attack and defence.”
Pant admitted that a batter tends to complicate thing when he is not batting well.
“When you are not doing well you tend to overthink,” he said. Meanwhile Beau Webster has concurred Pant’s view on the pitch.
“They (India batters) decided to knuckle down and made us bowl lot of overs. I am not sure what a good score on this track but we would have batted first had we won the toss,” said Webster.
India won the toss and decided to bat against Australia in Sydney, Yashasvi Jaiswal and KL Rahul opened for the tourists. The Indian openers failed to cement a soild partnership.
Starc drew first blood as he removed KL Rahul, while Jaiswal was dismissed by Boland. Before the end of first session, Lyon dismissed a crucial wicket as he dismissed Shubman Gill for 20 runs.
Boland started the day with the wicket of the dangerous Yashasvi Jaiswal and should have had Virat Kohli off the very next ball, but Steve Smith grassed the ball at slip before popping it to Marnus Labuschagne at gully.
Kohli scored 17 while Gill scored 20 runs before being dismissed by Boland and Lyon respectively.
After the dismissal of Kohli, Pant and Jadeja tried to make ar parntership but the wk-batter was sent out for 40 runs with Jadeja being sent out for 126 runs.
Meanwhile Nitish Reddy was sent out on a duck. After Jadeja’s dismissal for 26 runs, India lost 7 wickets for 134 runs. With Washington Sundar’s 14 runs and Bumrah’s 22 runs, India was able to cross 150 run mark and posted a total of 185 runs.
With trailing by 185 runs, Australia started their innings and played three overs where Bumrah picked the wicket of Usman Khawaja for 2 runs. Australia was with 9/1 by the end of day 01 at Sydney Cricket Ground.
