Ind vs Australia Melbourne Test: High hopes on Indian batters for Boxing Day contest

Melbourne's unpredictable weather sets the stage for India's cricket team training session before the Boxing Day Test.

A city that can throw up four seasons in a single day, decided to stick to the straight and the narrow on Tuesday (December 24, 2024). Melbourne’s whimsical skies turned a bright shade of blue, the sunlight was of the blinding type, hardly a leaf stirred and as the dry heat rose, a whiff of eucalyptus scent wafted in from the trees of the same name in the vicinity of the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

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In this afternoon of oppressive warmth, while the rest of the city slipped into the Christmas-eve mode, Rohit Sharma’s men turned up to train. Fielding drills happened in the main venue while key batters and bowlers moved to the outdoor nets. The fans, standing on the mezzanine floor, had a bird’s eye-view, and at times yelled ‘Kohli’, ‘Bumrah’ and ‘Rohit’, much to the discomfort of the players fine-tuning their craft.

That Jasprit Bumrah now exudes a rockstar vibe was evident when there was spontaneous applause when he walked in. Prior to this, he along with Rohit and coach Gautam Gambhir had a look at the pitch. Yashasvi Jaiswal, K.L. Rahul, Virat Kohli, Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant and Nitish Kumar had their initial stints with the bat.

Throwdowns, spin and pace were all pressed into service. While Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar and a few net bowlers provided by Cricket Australia, wheeled their arms over, among the speedsters, Bumrah turned up late and initially preferred to fire his thunderbolts from a short run-up.

Meanwhile, Rohit, who had suffered a blow on his left knee during training here on Sunday, stood for a long time. He exchanged notes with Gambhir and chief-selector Ajit Agarkar, and when it appeared as if he might not bat, Rohit strode into the net and spent a long session against throwdowns. While fine-tuning his defence seemed a priority, the Indian skipper was not averse to loft and pull when an opportunity arose.

A snatch of Kannada too was heard when Rahul squared up to Prasidh Krishna. Most batters, be it Kohli, Rohit or Rahul, kept telling the seamers to focus on the fifth-stump line on the off-side. In between, a fan kept repeating Jaiswal’s name and when the perplexed batter looked up, he was told to just wave his hand once! Hopefully when the Boxing Day Test commences here on Thursday (December 26, 2024) the Indian batters will collectively put their hands up and perform.