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Bench strength proving useful

Mike Hussey

— Photo: S. Subramanium

Coming good: Nathan Hauritz has improved as a bowler with a lot of self-belief.

When we embarked on this tour of India, we knew we were in for a fight. Now, with four matches gone, we are extremely happy to be 2-2, with no clear winner in sight as yet.

At Mohali on Monday, we pulled off a real gutsy win. At the halfway mark, we were quite disappointed to end with the total we did. The conditions were perfect right through and we thought we ended at least 20-30 runs short.

In the end though, we fought very hard on the field and our bowlers did a tremendous job in restricting the Indians. It was tough out there and that we came through is really heartening.

We were well poised to get more runs than we did in the last 10 overs but credit must also go to the Indian bowlers who did a good job. That fella Praveen Kumar is one who plays the game hard and sometimes can make things difficult for the opposition. He is a thoughtful bowler and makes a lot of changes to his pace. He is quite skilful too.

I suppose it was the dew factor that prompted the Indians to chase rather than set a target. And in the earlier matches I have played at Mohali, the dew has made a difference. Even on Monday night there was a lot of dew but somehow the conditions weren’t as wet as it was in Delhi.

More than the victory itself, what is giving me more satisfaction is the fact that we are really testing our bench strength here and yet holding our own. Around 6-7 of our first eleven are missing from this series now and that is a huge gap to follow.

You see, coming to India is always seen as one of the biggest challenges for an Australian cricketer as the conditions here are totally different to what we get back home and for our youngsters to step up and deliver is a real test.

What helps is our domestic system, which is one of the best in the world if not the best. I haven’t seen too much of our first class cricket in the last couple of years and so won’t be able to talk about any new talents in the wings — or even lack of it for that matter — but what our system does is try and narrow the gap between first class and international cricket.

Take Nathan Hauritz’s case for example. He’s such an improved bowler over the last year or so. There was a gap to be bridged and he’s done that part now. There’s a lot of self-belief that has kicked in and he feels more and more like he belongs at this level.

Hawkeye Communications

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