BENGALURU : When the India women’s head coach Ramesh Powar and Test and ODI captain Mithali Raj sat down for a press conference on Saturday, the pink ball Test Down Under next month was a subject of many queries.
The duo might have been a tad surprised considering the focus point of the tour is the ODI series against Australia with the World Cup looming next year. But, for a team, which only played their first Test match after a gap of seven years in June, playing under light in the longer format is another historic moment.
With none of the players in the team having pink ball experience, it is going to be a huge challenge against one of the best teams in the world.
As part of their preparations, the women’s team has even got in touch with few players from the men’s team.
Their decent show in the one-off drawn Test in England should give them the much needed confidence to shine with the pink ball.
What makes it even more challenging is the fact they will just have five days to prepare after the conclusion of the three-match ODI series for the pink ball Test, starting September 30.
“The challenges will be more of playing under lights. We have never played Test matches under lights. The one-dayers (day/night) are also not frequent and we get to play that also. And also (the other challenge is) playing with the pink ball as we are all used to red cherry. Playing pink in twilight time is also difficult, it is the feedback we got when interacting with some of the men cricketers. So let us see how we stand up to the challenge,” said Mithali in a pre-departure virtual interaction.
Powar stressed that their recently concluded camp in Bengaluru has helped the team prepare for all formats.
However, he was quite clear in his current focus, which is preparing for the World Cup, which is scheduled to take place in New Zealand next March.
Since the restart, the team has lost limited-overs series to South Africa and England and have a huge challenge ahead of them.
During their camp in Bengaluru, they engaged in match simulations, played some practice matches under lights, and also practiced in the centre wicket as well.
Key among their preparation was the need to be a bit more aggressive in the middle overs and reducing the dot balls.
“We know the areas that we need to improve when we came back from the UK tour. We have addressed those issues during the preparatory camp here in Bengaluru. We are hoping to come good as a unit in Australia. Whatever the result, we still have a few months of preparation for the World Cup. Australia is going to be tough and a good tour for us before the World Cup as we will be playing against the best. So we will know where we stand. We also will get to know the team composition that we are pretty much looking into the world cup,” said Mithali. India also play three-match T20I series in Australia.