History beckons Kohli as India gear up for final push against Australia

Skipper Virat Kohli knows how difficult it is to beat any international team in its own backyard. He has been part of India teams that toured South Africa, England and Australia in the last decade or so with great expectations. Kohli played alongside some of the greats of Indian cricket and all that they could do is win the odd Test match, not the series.

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Kohli should fondly remember the 2014 tour because it was in Sydney that he took over as captain after MS Dhoni announced his retirement from Tests. He actually led the side in the first Test at the Adelaide Oval in the absence of injured Dhoni and scored a hundred in each innings. In Sydney, he hit his third century of the series.

Kohli keeps talking about focus and has now added the word obsession. The players are focused and the team is obsessed. His other favourite line is that the team is always in the present and is unconcerned about what happened in the previous game.

He knows his team is on the cusp of doing something no other Indian team has done in Australia — win a series. They are up 2-1 after their victory in the Boxing Day Test and have retained the Border-Gavaskar Trophy by taking an unbeatable lead in the four-Test series.

Like all India teams over the last couple of decades, this side has players of class as well as sound application. Importantly, it has bowlers who can win the matches if they are given enough runs to bowl at.

Four years ago, it was in Sydney that KL Rahul scored a hundred opening the innings. Murali Vijay too hit a century at the Gabba and was pretty consistent throughout the series. Vijay has fallen by the wayside now, unable to adjust to the bounce, whereas Rahul has been resurrected for the last Test after being dropped in Melbourne.

Rahul will open with a secure Mayank Agarwal, his Karnataka teammate, and that should give him some much-needed confidence. It would be a treat if both get going. For that, Rahul must sort out his technical glitches and also issues of temperament.Kohli is right — once the team starts getting results, the players start believing in themselves as they grow in confidence and ‘that’s a beautiful sight to see’. These victories also lead to their evolution as cricketers.

The best example of that is Cheteshwar Pujara, who has shown the team management that there is a place for grafters like him. His two hundreds are a testimony to his unwavering approach. Pujara has shown he need not worry about what’s happening at the other end. Unlike Dravid, he does not have Tendulkar, Ganguly and Laxman to follow him. He only has Kohli.

Now that Rohit Sharma is back in Mumbai with his wife, celebrating the birth of their daughter, the line-up needed to be tweaked. His place should ideally go to Ravichandran Ashwin, who can safely be called an all-rounder, given his four Test hundreds and 11 other 50 plus scores. But his fitness is still in doubt with a side strain keeping him out of the third Test.  

If he is not confident of bowling long spells, the place might go to chinaman Kuldeep Yadav. If Ashwin does not play, Hanuma Vihari will get to bowl more and Kohli seems to have a lot of confidence in the Andhra all-rounder’s off-spin. The loss of the injured Ishant Sharma poses a question of whether to play Umesh Yadav or bring in Kuldeep. If Umesh plays, the team will have three pacers who can bowl 140-plus consistently. 

The Australians have more problems and they are shuffling their top order yet again, bringing in leg-spinning all-rounder Marnus Labuschagne to bat at No 3 and pushing Usman Khawaja up to open in place of off-form Aaron Finch. It will be a Test to watch as both teams have plenty to play for.  
(The writer is a veteran commentator and the views expressed are personal. He can be reached at sveturi@gmail.com)