Sydney: There was no visible pain on his face when he addressed the media after the day’s play at the Sydney Cricket Ground but Rishabh Pant is certain to wake up with a lot of soreness. During his 98-ball 40 versus Australia, the left-hander copped a lot of blows and two of them – near the groin area and left bicep – looked very painful. The blow to the bicep instantly turned the point of impact blue and it had to be taped up for him to continue.
Yes, he continued batting but there were more blows in store as Mitchell Starc hit him on the grill of the helmet and his back. Scott Boland and Pat Cummins, too, kept firing from the other end as the groin area received some damage on a couple of occasions but the 27-year-old was in for the fight and kept battling it out despite all the blows.
“Take a bullet for your country,” was head coach Gautam Gambhir’s advice for Nitish Reddy but here Pant was giving an exhibition of how it’s actually done in the middle. It looked ugly, he would shut his eyes in pain on numerous occasions, kept receiving attention from the physios but not once did he lose focus from the job at hand. He walked in at a delicate position and against his natural game, put in a fight with Ravindra Jadeja when the pitch got a bit spicier in the afternoon session.
By his own admission, it was the first time the left-hander was hit that many times. Even with his audacious stroke play, where he even goes airborne and gets into awkward positions, he has rarely been hit but it wasn’t something which was playing on his mind when he was facing the relentless Aussie pace trio.
“I think this is the first time I’ve gotten hit so much but you know in cricket you can’t plan anything. So everything happens for the first time for sure at some point of time in your career but that was me today so not thinking about that too much,” said Pant in the press conference.
India’s ‘freak’ in the middle-order spoke with a lot of maturity during the interaction and patiently explained his new approach in the whites where he is ready for the grind to help the team’s cause. There had been widespread criticism of his shot-selection in the MCG Test but he claimed to be “pretty fine” with his means and ways of doing the job.
“Sometimes you have to play more sensible cricket I would say… Like there might be a 50-50 chance which I could have taken early on in this inning but sometimes you have to play more secure cricket especially the way wicket was behaving. We knew that if we lost one more wicket here we might lose 2-3 in a quick succession. So that was the idea behind the way I was playing. And last match, there was nothing much to do. The kind of target we had, I think I had to play that way. So I think I’m pretty fine with the way I’m playing,” explained Pant on his approach.
In the 42 Tests he’s appeared in so far, Pant has played a certain brand of cricket which has instilled fear in the opposition’s mind. He is not looking to curb himself but certainly trying to find that right balance between aggressive and watchful cricket.
“It is a natural habit to back whatever the way you have played games but eventually you got to keep on evolving. I feel there is not one way to play cricket but whatever comes more naturally is always better. You have to find that balance between playing aggressive cricket and having that balance when you play all those shots. That’s what I’m trying to do. Just trying to make the most out of whatever the way I’m playing and just keep it simple not to overthink because you know when you’re not having the best of the tours you might overthink too much, but I just try to keep it simple and give my 200% on the field and that’s the idea about playing cricket for me,” added Pant.
For the high standards he has set with his previous outings Down Under, Pant has clearly underachieved in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy but his scrape on Friday served a reminder that the fighter in him is still alive, and will turn up with renewed energy in spite of the lusty blows!
