For Suryakumar Yadav and Harshal Patel, the trip to Australia for the looming T20 World Cup happens to be their first to the sporting country Down Under for India.
While Yadav has never previously been to the nation, Patel’s only tryst with the rough cricketing destination came in 2009 on a U-19 trip. Hence, the two players recognise how critical it is for them to make their early arrival to Australia count. The Indian team reached Australia on October 6 and immediately entered a conditioning camp which will last a week in Perth before they move to Brisbane for their ICC-organised warm-up games.
During this camp, the focus will be on conditioning themselves to the pace and bounce that is unique to Australia. Rohit Sharma and company will also be playing a warm-up game versus Western Australia as part of their larger goal.
Since it’s October, the weather that has treated the Indian players first-up has been cold, combined with the fresh breeze in Perth.
“It’s obviously quite cold. We’re slowly acclimatising,”
Patel said in an interview for the BCCI site.
The word “acclimatising” is key for Patel, who said his intention is to “adapt quickly” to the conditions in Australia, not just in terms of his skill with the ball but also physically and mentally.
For Suryakumar, the goal is to marry his adventurous strokeplay with the rising bounce on the Australian pitches and be able to consistently fetch the boundaries on what are still the biggest outfields in world cricket.
“I just wanted to see what the pace of the wicket [is] and bounce, so I’m starting a little slow,”
he said of his couple of net sessions at the start of the tour.
“Ground dimensions, people say grounds are very big, so it’s important to ready your game plan [accordingly], how you’re going to score runs, all those things are important.”
Among the two, Suryakumar has been in better sync with his game on the field, being India’s highest run-scorer in T20Is for the year. He has been in tremendous form since India truly picked up pace with their T20 World Cup preparations from the Asia Cup in UAE.
Patel has been a worry, though. Entrusted to bowl in the middle and the death, the right-arm quick, whose slow dippers are expected to taste success on big grounds in Australia, has gone for more than 11 an over in the end-overs phase since his T20I debut last November.
