Rohit applied himself very well and made some good decisions: Trent Boult

All eyes were on Shikhar Dhawan in this Test as the Delhi southpaw was picked ahead of his domestic teammate Gautam Gambhir for the game after KL Rahul was ruled out of the remainder of the series. Dhawan was earlier excluded from the squad for the 1st Test since he hasn’t been in the best of forms of late whereas Gambhir was picked as a replacement for Rahul because of his rich form. Dhawan perished early in the first inning and had a tough stay in the second knock as well before falling to Trent Boult.

The swing bowler used the spongy bounce on offer from the wicket and ruffled the Indian opener at least a couple of times. He was also hit on the thumb of his left hand twice which later proved to have put him out of course for at least 3 weeks. Boult caught him in front of the stump while he had scored just 17 runs.

Talking to the reporters after the end of the day’s play Boult also mentioned his duel with Dhawan and said, “Yeah, I enjoyed it and it was very nice to get him out in the end. We’ve been mates now for a couple of years and he is a class player. Not too much of a contest there. I was just trying to put the ball in a good areas and set-up the team.”

On the day, it was Rohit Sharma who stood as the defying force as far as the batters are concerned. He played one of his better Test knocks and got to a well earned half century. The bowler also praised his effort and said, “Rohit applied himself very well and made some good decisions. He was tested there throughout how whole innings. A lot of credit to him on a wicket that is going up and down and a little bit of reverse swing there at the end. He batted very well,” Boult said.

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New Zealand were well in charge of the game at one stage but Rohit and his century partnership with Wriddhiman Saha changed the course completely. “We were trying to apply the pressure for as long as we could and not let off at all throughout the whole innings. But we know and realise they are going to put partnerships together and we just can’t afford to get frustrated by that. It is still a challenge as a bowling unit to not drift and release that pressure but it is something we are trying to get much better at,

“The luxury is we don’t just have one plan for each batter. By changing the field and manipulating people here and there is just moving between plans. Virat Kohli (who made 45) is a massive player for them and we know what a tone he sets in that batting order. It was nice to get him out eventually and we bowled very nicely to him to not let him cash in too nicely. To get him out for 40-odd was a massive wicket. We all bowled very nicely to him.” Boult said.

He also praised Jeetan Patel’s resistant knock with the bat on the 3rd day morning that helped them kick down the deficit. “He did very well. It’s his first in a wee while and to come back and play an innings like that was good to watch. The rest of us can take a leaf out of his book and try to apply yourself like he did because they were valuable runs.” The pacer added.

The Eden Gardens pitch has been a tough one for the batsmen and Team India already have a lead worth 339 runs a total never scaled in the 4th innings at the venue. But Boult said that his team was ready to chase down any total set ahead of them.

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“We have the guys with the ability to bat long periods of time. In terms of the wicket, there is a little bit of variation in bounce and that is obviously going to be in the back of a few of our minds. We have to take it small steps at a time. If we can tick off our goals of trying to bat for half a session, then a session and just keep them out there and try to build like that. Anything that is set is definitely achievable.”