JOHANNESBURG: India's premier spinner R Ashwin termed his team's first innings score as slightly below par on a "two paced" Wanderers pitch but might be enough with their bowling arsenal to make a match of the second Test against South Africa.
India finished their first innings at 202 with Ashwin scoring a crucial 46 towards the end of the innings on a testing pitch after stand-in skipper KL Rahul (50) opted to bat.
"(What is a) good total in South Africa has been tricky, especially in the first innings. It's always a good thing to win the toss and bat first and you want to post a good score in excess of maybe 260 or 270 which is around about score," Ashwin replied when asked what a tricky total is.
"South Africa always batted first (in the past) and got in excess of 250 and dominated games. Maybe we are a bit short. But I still think we've got our entire bowling arsenal available tomorrow. Fingers crossed. We can definitely make something out of this total," he said hoping Siraj will be fit to bowl on Tuesday.
The champion off-spinner also hoped that the pitch to quicken up on day two.
"I just felt the pitch was a little two-paced. Generally, Wanderers (pitch) has the tendency to start a bit slower and start getting quicker. It did quicken up a bit but it just feels a little different to a typical Wanderers pitch so we'll have to wait and see how it responds tomorrow."
Regained his batting flow
Ashwin scored at an impressive strike rate of 92 in his innings including six fours and was not afraid to attack the pacers.
For someone, who saved a Test match in Sydney alongside Hanuma Vihari earlier this year, Ashwin feels he has got flow back in his batting.
"Look, I think in between somewhere for a couple of years, trying to you know sort of get very technically right or whatever it is to try and build on scores, I think I lost a bit of my flow with respect to getting into good positions at the crease and I've always I knew even before that I've always batted at a good clip," Ashwin said.
"So it's not been a conscious effort to go out there and keep playing those shots. If it's there, it's there. For me, I get into positions where I can play some of those shots, which may be some of the other specialist batters might not be able to play but this freedom is what gave me success in the past."
Success of Rahul, there can't be one formula
Rahul has been stand-out batter for India in the series, carrying on his good work in England.
Ashwin said Rahul has cracked his own formula to succeed in the longest format.
"In Test cricket, there is no one formula for success. Teams are analysing, there's a lot more footage available. There is a lot more technical assessment and breakdowns that go on in today's world and Test cricket is all about you responding to the different sorts of questions that are being thrown at you... and KL has found that solution to what's what he probably thought he needed to respond to and it's working for him and he's one of those players who's got the game we all know that he's got the game he's got the raw material so it's all about how you keep finding out and keep answering these constant questions that are being thrown at you."
"Since the England series, he has looked the part," Ashwin added.