Australia vs India 2018-19: Cheteshwar Pujara Taking Pressure off Virat Kohli is Massive Reason for India’s Series Win: Damien Martyn
Jan 4, 2019 at 2:06 PM
Former Australia cricketer Damien Martyn has hailed Indian National Cricket team batsman Cheteshwar Pujara, who has notched his third century of the Border-Gavaskar series.
Meanwhile, with their win at Melbourne, India have retained the trophy going 2-1 up in the series. And now they are staring at their first-ever series win against Australia Down Under. His series returns of 521 runs in seven innings is the third best for a visiting Indian batsman in Australia after Virat Kohli’s 692 scored in 2014-15 and Rahul Dravid’s 619 from the 2003-04 tour. Only Kohli, with four, has scored more than three Test hundreds in a series in Australia.
And according to Damien Martyn, Cheteshwar Pujara have eased off the pressure from Virat Kohli.
“Look at those stats. It’s not everyday that someone comes to Australia and performs that way,” said Martyn on a show for ESPNcricinfo. “Three Tests hundreds … he’s up there with Kohli and [Sachin] Tendulkar, so he’s been outstanding which is the resolve of just batting a long time. It’s old school Test cricket, which I think nowadays lacks a bit.
“You don’t see a lot of players coming through now with that kind of skill. For Test cricket, this works and it works for Kohli and the Indian cricket team. They can bat around him [Pujara] and it takes pressure of Kohli. He’s been one of the massive reasons why they’ve won this series,” he added.