Sai Sudharsan not worried about competition for spots
B Sai Sudharsan and L Balaji addressed the media ahead of their first one-dayer against Australia A in Puducherry • CAP
After missing the two-match Test series in Sri Lanka with a toe injury, B Sai Sudharsan lost his No. 3 spot to Devdutt Padikkal. But the 24-year-old batter isn't perturbed by the competition for spots and is focussed on charting his own path.
"I feel mentally we have to understand that we are all writing our own story rather than playing against each other," Sai Sudharsan said on the eve of India A's first one-dayer against Australia A in Puducherry. "Having trust and belief in ourselves and divine timing will make everything pan out fantastically well.
Sai Sudharsan is a specialist opener for Tamil Nadu in the Vijay Hazare Trophy and Gujarat Titans (GT) in the IPL. However, it remains to be seen whether there's room for him to slot in at the top in the one-day series against Australia A in Puducherry.
Apart from Sai Sudharsan, Priyansh Arya, Prabhsimran Singh, Devdutt Padikkal and Arshin Kulkarni are all in the top-order mix. Captain Ruturaj Gaikwad, meanwhile, is likely to slot in at No.4, a role Gaikwad recently played for the senior team in the ODIs against West Indies.
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"I don't think I am looking at finding a place anywhere," Sai Sudharsan said. "I have always been opening in 50-over cricket and T20 cricket. So, I look at it that way and try to give my best and perform so that the team wins from a good position. That's what I'm focused on."
Sai Sudharsan marked his return from injury with a steady half-century on an up-and-down pitch in the first four-dayer last month before managing only 8 and 12 in the second four-dayer. He is now eager to test himself in white-ball cricket against an Australia A team that includes a number of internationals.
"The intensity on A tours is almost on par with international cricket," Sai Sudharsan said. "As Bala Sir [India A head coach L Balaji] said, shadow tours help fine-tune our batting, bowling, and decision-making continuously. With the Border-Gavaskar Trophy coming up in a few months, these multi-day A-games help us understand how pitches behave and how Australian culture operates. Tomorrow's game will feel like a proper international match."
Balaji, the India A head coach for this A series and the bowling coach at the BCCI's Centre of Excellence, was particularly impressed with India's depth.
"Four teams were competing simultaneously - Rest of India in Srinagar, India A in Pondicherry, the main [ODI] team in the West Indies, and another in the Asian Games," Balaji said. "It's good to have healthy competition. Players have space to work across three formats. The mindset should be to make the most of these ample opportunities, and those performing are getting their due."
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