A GENERAL view of the Perth Stadium on Thursday.—AFP
Kohli said he was impressed by the new arena and not concerned by a wicket that is set to favour fast bowlers, with Australia having a world-class line-up of Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins.
He pointed to his own attack of Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, saying they were “at the peak of their abilities”.
Meanwhile, Australia skipper Tim Paine came to the defence of under-fire Mitchell Starc and Aaron Finch as they were included in an unchanged team for the Perth Test despite below-par performances in the defeat in Adelaide.
Once again Starc, Hazelwood and Cummins will shoulder the bowling load on an expected pacey wicket, with Nathan Lyon the spin option.
There had been speculation that Peter Siddle could replace Starc who had some wayward spells at Adelaide, including a string of costly byes in India’s second innings.
Paine said the criticism of Starc was over the top.
“The criticism he has come under this week has been pretty unfair to be honest. I think barring two or three overs in Adelaide where he got his radar a little bit wrong, I thought he bowled really well,” the skipper said.
“I think his best and his worst are getting closer together. I think we’re getting really close to his best and the conditions here are going to suit him down to the ground.”
He added that Starc took the comments personally, and it had fired him up.
“One thing I know about Starcy is that if he cops a bit of criticism he takes it personally and that sometimes gets the best out of him. So I’m pretty pumped to see him go tomorrow or the next day and see what he can produce.”
The selectors also retained Finch to face the new ball alongside rookie Marcus Harris despite his first Test failures and talk that he could move down the order with Usman Khawaja bumped up to opener.
Finch, Australia’s ODI and T20 captain, spent time with former skipper Ricky Ponting at training on Thursday, and Paine backed him to find form.
“We encourage all our players to back their strengths and Finchy has been successful at international cricket,” he said.
Teams:
AUSTRALIA: Marcus Harris, Aaron Finch, Usman Khawaja, Shaun Marsh, Travis Head, Peter Handscomb, Tim Paine (captain), Josh Hazlewood, Pat Cummins, Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Starc
INDIA (from): Virat Kohli (captain), Murali Vijay, K.L. Rahul, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Hanuma Vihari, Rishabh Pant, Ravindra Jadeja, Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Umesh Yadav
Umpires: Kumar Dharmasena (Sri Lanka), Chris Gaffaney (New Zealand)
TV umpire: Nigel Llong (England)
Match referee: Ranjan Madugalle (Sri Lanka).
Published in Dawn, December 14th, 2018