GUWAHATI: For millennials, this may seem all too strange, but India is on the cusp of something magical. Beat Australia at the new Barsapara Cricket Stadium — a picturesque setting even if it looks like a budget version of Cape Town — and they would have beaten the Kangaroos in all three formats in the same year.
For a team that consistently tapped out whenever the green & gold appeared in the rearview mirror, it’s been a remarkable transformation. David has become Goliath and vice versa.
Stand-in skipper David Warner, Steve Smith has left for Australia thanks to a shoulder injury, said it was going to be a challenge to keep the series alive going into the third game in Hyderabad.
“Getting a victory over here is always challenging. It’s going to be tough, you have to play the best of your ability. If you give India a sniff on home soil, they are going to pounce.”
Which is what Australia has been doing ever since they landed for the ODI series last month. They have always left the door ajar in the middle overs and Virat Kohli’s men have repeatedly driven battering rams past it to break it open.
The first T20I is a case in point. Australia was in a good position at 55-1 but lost their way, ultimately limping to 114-8. More presence of mind could have put India in a pickle in the rain-curtailed affair.
One guy instrumental in triggering those collapses is Kuldeep Yadav, yet to taste defeat against the visitors (two Tests, four ODIs and one T20I). He doesn’t agree that he is a mystery bowler but reckons his partnership with Yuzvendra Chahal has been good.
“We’ve known each other for five years,” he said. “It’s easy to understand what his plans are, what my plans are. Even in games, we bowl in partnerships and you can see the impact.”
His role model, Shane Warne, is already a fan (he posted as much on Twitter) and the left-arm spinner says he has been learning from him. “If I become 50% of what he was, my life will be successful. (I try and take) from Warne, his wrist work, flight and drift to deceive batsmen.”
Given it will be the first international fixture in Barsapara, predictions are laced with danger. However, if you are a better man, put your mortgage on the hosts. Their last seven T20Is against Tuesday’s opposition have all been ‘W’.