Australian coach Justin Langer has lamented a lack of world-class batsmen in his side’s line-up and pointed out that Vitat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara have been the difference for the visitors in the on-going four-match Test series.
India won the third Test at the MCG by 131 runs to take an unassailable 2-1 lead in the series. The fourth Test begins in Sydney Thursday.
“At this stage, the difference in the series is Pujara and Kohli, if we’re frank. Pujara averages 53 and Kohli has averaged 46 and got a duck in the second innings. The lesson we learn from that is he just absorbed all our pressure,” Langer said Monday.
“It’s the art of batting, isn’t it? It’s about absorbing pressure. You’ve got so much time in Test cricket, and I guess in the (T20) world we live in, everything is so instant and so quick and talk about strike rates. Our guys are learning that, or hopefully they’re learning that. If they don’t we’ll keep having performances like we’re having,” he said.
Langer blamed the first innings batting flop-show — 151 all out — for Australia’s defeat in the third Test at the MCG.
“It was a really tough Test match. I’ve said from day one it’s going to be a real arm wrestle the Test series and it feels like that. It has been tough, we probably got the worst of the conditions in this Test match and our first innings batting particularly was not up to the work we put into it. We feel disappointed and tired, but we are getting ready to refresh and get ready for the fourth one,” he added.
Langer said the relative inexperience of the Australian batting line-up was starting to show as the series heads towards its culmination.
“He (Finch) is having a bit of a lean run of it although he has got a couple of fifties. He got a 100 run partnership one Test match ago and that set up the whole Test match for us. Finch is a really good player and he is working harder probably than he has ever worked. He has got to somehow recharge his batteries over and over again. It is a great challenge for him at the moment and he will be better I think,” said the coach.
