SYDNEY: India’s Jasprit Bumrah will go down as "one of the greatest fast bowlers to play the game”, Australia’s Travis Head said on Monday, ahead of the day-night Test in Adelaide this week. Stand-in skipper Bumrah took eight wickets in the first Test to help the visitors to a crushing 295-run victory last week in Perth.
The 30-year-old is set to hand the captaincy back to regular skipper Rohit Sharma for the second Test starting on Friday. Unburdened by leadership duties, Bumrah could be even more of a threat under lights with the pink ball.
"Jasprit is probably going to go down as one of the greatest fast bowlers to play the game,” top-order batsman Head told reporters. "We’re finding that at the moment, how challenging he can be, and it’s nice to play against that. "It’s going to be nice to look back at your career and tell the grandkids that you faced him, so it’s not a bad series to play in with him.
"But hopefully I only have to face (him) a few more times. He’s been challenging.” Head top-scored for Australia with 89 in the hosts’ second innings in Perth, and he will be on familiar territory on his home turf at the Adelaide Oval. But for all that, the 30-year-old said: "It’s just another week — go and prepare and go in fresh and hopefully I can roll out the same sort of performances. "It’s going to be a challenge but I feel like I’m moving well, feel like I’m in a good space and go out and try and execute that.”
He said that the hosts, who came into the five-match Border-Gavaskar Trophy series as favorites, had quickly got over the shock of their heavy loss in the opener. "The writing was on the wall pretty quickly in that Test match that we were pushing it uphill,” he said. "So for me it was reflecting in-game what we could have done better by the time that result had come.
"(It’s) a pretty easy one as such to move on and get over, and start talking about what’s coming.”
Meanwhile, Australia will draw confidence from their exceptional record in day-night tests and expect to rebound from their Perth setback when they face India in the second match in Adelaide, wicketkeeper Alex Carey has said.
Australia have won 11 of their 12 pink ball tests and all seven they have played at Adelaide Oval, including a victory over India in the last home test series when they skittled Virat Kohli’s team for 36. "We’re excited. We should take a lot - and we do take a lot of confidence out of our record from pink ball cricket,” Carey told reporters on Tuesday.
"It doesn’t mean we’ll have the success but I think our methods, our style of play and the experience we have with this group, we’ll bounce back from Perth. "I’m sure India will be confident from the last game as well, so it will be a great contest,” added Carey.
India scored a resounding 295-run victory at Perth Stadium in the opening test of the five-match series. Australia’s winning streak in day-night tests was ended in January by the West Indies, who won a cliffhanger by eight runs at the Gabba.
Australia head into the second test starting on Friday with some concern over the fitness of all-rounder Mitchell Marsh, who pulled up sore after bowling 17 overs in Perth. Australian media have speculated that Marsh may be retained as a specialist batsman alone, though selectors brought in another all-rounder into the squad in uncapped Beau Webster. Carey said he thought Marsh would be fit to play and had not heard otherwise from the team. "His batting has been fantastic since he’s come back into this team and his bowling again — he took some handy wickets,” he said. "Hopefully he is right and ready to go.” — Agencies