'He got 17 in 1st innings': Rahul Dravid's fiery statement settles Bharat vs Kishan debate before 4th Test vs Australia
Indian head coach Rahul Dravid was asked about KS Bharat's questionable batting performance in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy between India and Australia.
Recalling Rohit Sharma's batting masterclass against Australia in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Indian head coach Rahul Dravid observed that batters are only one good performance away from changing the tie on its head on Indian pitches. Even though the high-profile Border-Gavaskar Trophy is heading towards its business end, only skipper Rohit and veteran Cheteshwar Pujara have emerged as the top-order batters to have managed to register 50-plus scores against Australia in the first three Test matches of the bilateral series.
Indian skipper Rohit smashed a sublime 120 off 212 balls in the series opener at Nagpur while Pujara played a fighting knock of 59 (142) in the 3rd Test against Australia. Speaking to reporters ahead of the 4th Test at Ahmedabad on Tuesday, Indian head coach Dravid stressed the importance of having realistic batting benchmarks on challenging pitches.
With India set to take on Australia on a batting-friendly pitch of the famous Narendra Modi Stadium, uncapped wicketkeeper Ishan Kishan has an outside chance of making it to the Indian playing XI on Thursday. India's first-choice wicketkeeper KS Bharat remained Rishabh Pant's backup for quite some time before the star batter made his Test debut against Australia in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. Though Bharat has earned plaudits for his wicketkeeping, the Andhra star has struggled to register noteworthy scores with the bat.
"We are not (concerned) and it again comes to a question of perspective and understanding of some of the challenges and conditions that he has kept in and even though it's not a big contribution but he got 17 in the first innings," Dravid told reporters when the Indian head coach was asked about Bharat's batting performance in the Test series.
Dravid was seen coaching Kishan in the nets while Bharat received a rest from the optional session in the lead-up to the 4th Test between India and Australia. Extending his support to Bharat, the Indian head coach also reminded his critics about the batter's cameo in the Delhi Test match. "Got a nice contribution in Delhi where he played positively, and you need a little bit of luck in these conditions and he hasn't probably had that, and he is shaping really well and keeping really nicely for us. So we need to put batting performance in perspective," Dravid added.
Wicketkeeper-batter Bharat has scored 57 runs in the first three Test matches of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy between India and Australia. Indian all-rounders Ravichandran Ashwin (79) and Ravindra Jadeja (107) have scored more runs than the wicketkeeper-batter Bharat in the Australia Test series. The 29-year-old averaged only 14.25 in five innings against Australia.
