Adelaide, Jan 27: With 334 runs still required on the last day with only four wickets in hand, another Indian Test defeat is imminent. Speaking to the media after the end of the fourth day’s play, Ravichandran Ashwin reflected on India’s performance in the series, hoping that the limited overs’ leg of the tour would be a different ball game.
Excerpts from the end of day press conference at the Adelaide Oval:
On the match
Whatever foot we have put forward, it hasn’t gone our way. It’s been quite disappointing but at the end of the day, as the bunch of youngsters that are there in the squad, we will try to take as [many lessons] as possible and walk away with our heads high and try and put it into use elsewhere.
On the batting line-up and his role
[…] I was always at No 8. My duty was always to post a score on the board for the bowlers to work with if there was a slump. That is what we concentrated on. We wanted to outplay the Australian tail before we came into the series and I think we put a decent step forward and got a few runs in that respect.
On his bowling
I bowled well in Melbourne. There have been phases in this series when I have bowled really well […] I wouldn’t say I haven’t had much of luck, really, closing out the fourth or fifth wicket or probably the third or fourth wicket on occasion. We have always stumbled on the roadblock where we have got the three wickets and not got the fourth quickly enough to attack as a whole and gone into a break and come back and seized the initiative. There have been situations where it happened like that. With due credit, a couple of their batsmen have used their feet pretty well and with respect to that I have tried to adjust myself. In Australian conditions and with the Kookaburra ball, even if you deceived them in the flight, they just go through with their shots. These are [a few lessons] that I have taken back; probably the kind of stuff that I can work on with respect to batsmen when they are stepping out on wickets that have nothing in them. But as a whole, I think the ball has come out really well out of my hand. I have enjoyed the challenge that has been thrown at me. I have tried to really come forward with the bat and the ball.
On the Test losses and the Indian fan’s expectations from the T20Is and ODIs
[…] We have all competed really hard at the ground. It’s not like we have just chucked it away. We have given it everything that we had. Yes, we have come out short on occasion. There have been moments where we could have seized [the initiative] and it would have looked different. […] We have not had enough [runs] reserve in the bank to really do it. But at the end of the day, yes, we are extremely disappointed. Everything is going to be a fresh start [for the T20Is and the ODIs]. It’s going to be a different ball game. The colour of the ball also changes so hopefully we can change our luck as well.
