The tour of Sri Lanka presented an ideal opportunity for Australian all-rounder Moises Henriques to prove his calibre in the test arena. Henriques was being looked upon as a viable option in the test side and a backup all-rounder to Mitchell Marsh. Henriques had been in good form and on the basis of a strong show in the IPL, he was chosen for the test series in Sri Lanka. His previous experience of playing 3 tests in India was considered greatly as well.
As the tour panned out, Henriques returned home a tad disappointed. His technique was considered to be good enough to last in Asia, but the all-rounder was all at sea against the Sri Lankan spinners. In the games he featured in, he couldn’t make any bulky contribution from his end. In a chat with cricket.com.au, he opened up about the tour, and his choice of shot selection.
“I’ll probably try to get some super-glue on my back toe that just kept slipping over the white line every time, even when I wasn’t trying to advance down the wicket,” Henriques said about his knack of being over aggressive against the spinners. “That was quite disappointing to get out three times the same way and not learn on the run and not even realising you’re making the same mistake. “That was pretty frustrating, but again that’s something you have to prepare for now, that once you’ve made the mistake a couple of times you’re quite prone to it.”
He admitted that allotting him the role of a specialist batsman came in as a surprise. “I wasn’t really expecting it because I thought our boys would go over there and play well. “There were obviously a few decisions made after the second test.”If you asked me at the start of the series if I was expecting to bat five and play in the same team as Mitch Marsh, I probably wouldn’t have been expecting it. “I’ll take it and learn from it and hopefully be better from the opportunity.”
He concluded by saying that for the next tour of Asia, he would surely work out on his sweep shot. “I’d certainly practice my sweeping a lot further out. “I feel a lot of the successful batsmen over there did a lot of sweeping and even come the one-day tour, our guys that did well like ‘Wadey’and George Bailey did a lot of sweeping as well. “It’s definitely a shot I worked on over there but by the time I felt like I got it right, it was almost too late. “It’s certainly something I’d change if I had another tour there.”