Fourteen of the 15 India players in the final of the World Test Championship (WTC) played in the IPL, which was a very busy tournament in April and May. David Warner and Cameron Green were the only two Australians to play in the IPL. Michael Neser, Steven Smith, Marcus Harris, and Marnus Labuschagne all played county cricket.
Most of Australia’s team for the WTC final hasn’t played much competitive cricket since the four-match Test series in India finished in early March. Since then, neither team has played another Test match. Which brings us to the question of who is better prepared for the final, which starts on Wednesday at The Oval: India or Australia?
Ricky Ponting isn’t sure, but Pat Cummins, the leader of Australia, is sure that a break will help his team, especially since the WTC final will be followed by the five-Test Ashes series, which will be over in five weeks.
“Yeah, they’re hard to come by,” Cummins said before he talked about how important it was for players to take a break when they had been working so hard in all three forms, including franchise-based tournaments.
“So, yeah, we try to take breaks when we can. I’ve always said that, with six Test matches coming up in the next two months, I’d rather be a little bit underdone than a little bit overdone. That’s how a bowler would see it. I always feel like getting ready doesn’t take too much time. Then I want to make sure my body is in good shape for the games.”
Cummins decided not to play in this year’s IPL, but he had already made that choice before he left the India tour after the first two Tests to be with his family. At an ICC event on Sunday at The Oval to celebrate Test cricket, Cummins said that his team was ready for India because they had just come back from a three-day training camp in Beckenham, which had “refreshed” them.
He said, “We’ve had some great training at Beckenham over the past week.” “Of course, we trained a lot back home as well. So everyone has come in, we’ve trained hard, and everyone is re-energized, refreshed, and pretty keen.”
Minutes earlier, at the same event, Ponting said he wasn’t sure which team was better prepared, but he gave Australia a “slight” edge because The Oval is more like Australia, with good bounce, long square boundaries, and lots of warm weather predicted.
Ponting said, “As far as getting ready goes, some of the Australians haven’t done anything. They haven’t even been playing cricket.” “At least all the Indian players in the IPL have been playing very tough cricket. So, is it better to come in without any crickets? Or is it coming in maybe a little bit worn out and jaded after an IPL, but having played a lot of cricket before that? So, many things could happen this week.
“Talk to yourself and get your mind ready,” said Rohit Sharma.
The India players will have to switch from the white Kookaburra to the red Dukes. Rohit Sharma thinks that this is a task that modern players are used to. He said that the young players on the team should instead work on their minds.
“If you’re going to play, you have to figure this out in your head. You have to be flexible and make any small changes to your skill that you need to, he said. “But I think it’s more important to talk to yourself and get your mind ready. We have a lot of new guys in the team, so a lot of the other guys haven’t done that yet.
“I’ve just been talking to myself a lot and getting my mind ready, which is something a lot of us have been doing for a long time.”
Rohit must be believed. He had 648 runs in nine innings at the 2019 ODI World Cup, which was held in the same part of the world. He had five centuries and a half-century during those nine games. On his next trip, in 2021 (which went into 2022), he got the most runs for India in the Tests. In the fourth Test, at The Oval, he hit a hundred that won the game.
“You are never in” is the most important thing he has learned as a pitcher in England.
“In general, England is a tough place for batters, but if you are ready to work hard, you can have some success as a batter,” he said. “When I was hitting in 2021, I learned that the weather changes a lot, so you’re never really in. So you have to keep focusing for longer times, which is the challenge of this style. You’ll know when it’s your turn to take on the bowler because you’ll get a message or have a gut feeling. When that happens, you should be ready and, more importantly, you should be there.”
Rohit said it’s easy to score runs at The Oval if you keep your mind on that. “As far as we know, this is also one of the best places to bat,” he said. “You get value for your shots, the square limits are quite quick. So, to give yourself the best chance of succeeding, you just need to focus for longer amounts of time.
