Glenn Maxwell wants to cement his place in the Test team as the No.6 batsman
Australian all-rounder Glenn Maxwell who has been selected in the Australian squad for the Test series in India feels that he and his Aussie teammates don’t need to look further than their oppositions India when it comes to handling quality spinners on their forthcoming four-matches series against the World’s No.1 Test side. Maxwell who is looking to make the vacant No.6 position his own opined that sticking to one strategy against Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja won’t work for the visitors and they have to keep changing their mindset and thinking about the game.
“I’m not sure it’s a place you ever really feel comfortable. It’s a place where you’ve got to work so hard to get your runs, and you’ve got to have different strategies at different times of a game,” the 28-year-old swashbuckler was quoted as saying by cricket.com.au. “That’s probably what I’ve learned; you can’t go in there with just one strategy and stick to it,” he further added.
“You’ve got to be adaptable and you’ve got to be able to change your game almost mid-innings. So it’s going to be a real test of everyone. Even for the Indian players, you watch them, they go through different stages of their innings from sweeping, to using their feet, to playing off the back foot – they change all the way through their innings. Hopefully, we can do similar stuff and work on our play of spin because it’s going to be pretty key.”
The all-rounder has played only 3 Tests in his career so far with all of them played in Asia. The Victorian hard-hitter is clearly a more attractive choice for the selectors in Asian conditions. With the exclusion of Hilton Cartwright, the No.6 position is vacant and guys like Maxwell, Mitchell Marsh and Ashton Agar will fight it out for the place.
Also read: IPL 2017 Auction to be held on a new date in a new city
“I’d certainly like to be the No.6, in all countries,” he said. “I think it’d be a great position for me to try and nail down, and that’s something I’m hoping to do starting in India.
“So hopefully we can finish with a good result (in New Zealand), then I can head to Dubai (for Australia’s training camp) and start preparing for the next tour.”
Australia and New Zealand are currently battling it out in the Chappell-Hadlee series with the Black Caps leading the series 1-0. “We’re still pretty focused on the next game and there’s still a lot to play for,” Maxwell said.
“We do take this Chappell-Hadlee (series) very seriously, and the way we played in the Australian series probably shows that – we dominated that series and we were looking to do that when we came over here as well,” Maxwell concluded.
Also read: Looking forward to consult Ashwin after the game: Mehedi Hasan
Download Our App