.jpg)
|| Indian Correspondent ||
Team India have secured a 2-1 series win against Australia recently where many of their key players were injured. However, Australia pace spearhead Pat Cummins applauded Cheteshwar Pujara for his stunning performance Down Under. He also referred to him as a "brick wall".
Meanwhile, Cummins also revealed that he targeted Pujara to dismiss after the Indian captain Virat Kohli returned home after the first Test. Kohli missed the last three Tests of the series as he wanted to be with his wife Anushka Sharma for the birth of their first child. Notably, Team India won the series 2-1 as well.
Cummins, who was Australia's vice-captain in the longer format, said that Pujara became the deciding factor for the series with his rock-solid defence with the bat as well.
"My initial thought was that he (Pujara) was the brick wall, so once we opened up his end, I thought that still made all three results in the game possible, winning, losing or a draw. But it was satisfying too: before the series, once we knew Virat (Kohli) was going to miss the last three Tests, Pujara was the big wicket for me. He was the deciding factor in the series a couple of years earlier — he was their rock in the middle order — and I felt a big part of the series battle would be played out against him," the speedster was quoted as saying in ESPNCricinfo's 'The Cricket Monthly'.
It is also noteworthy that, Cummins dismissed Pujara five times in eight innings, whereas Pujara scored 271 runs off 928 balls, which also included his series-defining knocks in Sydney and Brisbane. He also said that for a bowler, Pujara is someone who is very difficult to bowl as he doesn't get affected by anything.
"He was a huge deciding factor in them drawing Sydney and then winning at the Gabba, so he certainly made a big mark on the series. After the first two games, I thought he (Pujara) might have had to adapt to try to take the game on a little bit more and put pressure back on the bowlers," said Pat Cummins who claimed 21 wickets from the four matches as well.
It is also noteworthy that, Pujara faced many painful blows on his body in his 211-ball 56-run knock which helped India's historic three-wicket win in the fourth and final Test in Brisbane.
"...it's incredibly rare that someone gets hit on his body and wears so many bruises without trying something...he really stuck to his processes," Cummins said. "...it's like a pillow (Pujara's soft hands). Just soft hands, plays it incredibly late, you can see why someone like that is so hard to dislodge, because there aren't edges flying to the slip cordon."
