Australia and India: Duel in Adelaide Amid Challenges
In a year marked by the Covid-19 pandemic, Australia and India face each other on the same stage where their previous encounter began in 2018: the Adelaide Oval. The view of the scoreboard and the Moreton Bay trees provide a sense of continuity intrinsic to test cricket, and will be a backdrop for Tim Paine and Virat Kohli’s teams in the first day/night Test for the Indian team away from home. However, there will be much more to appreciate in the encounter between two of cricket’s most powerful nations than at any other time they have crossed paths since they began almost constant contact 20 years ago. Not least, the fact that the series is taking place. After difficult months in March, April, and May, where the world was almost entirely without sports, there was plenty of time to reflect on that bleak possibility, and more recently, the issues at hand had much to do with the obstacles to organizing the series, even when there was so much goodwill between Cricket Australia and the BCCI for this to happen. In a year in which its leaders have faced pitched battles with state associations, state governments, and rights broadcasters, CA has been grateful that India’s administrators and players never raised major issues about the tour. Instead, the hurdles for CA’s interim chief executive Nick Hockley and chairman Earl Eddings largely had to do with finding a port of entry for the charter plane carrying the touring team. From initial plans to land in Perth, the plan moved to Adelaide and then to Brisbane before finally being captured by Sydney, Canberra, the New South Wales government and the SCG Trust. Anxiety levels were never higher than during a long and, ultimately, unsuccessful negotiation with the Queensland government. Even after the Indians arrived, there was a possibility that a Covid outbreak in Adelaide would disrupt the series. For a long time, Adelaide Oval had been scheduled to host at least one and possibly two tests, given the prolonged quarantine Melbourne faced for most of the year, which kept a cloud over Boxing Day until October. But the outbreak that forced a harsh, albeit brief, quarantine in South Australia had contingencies that were reversed to start the test series with a day/night test at the MCG and then continue playing a more traditional game from December 26 onwards. All these permutations were at the forefront of the mind of Adelaide Oval curator Damian Hough, who has dealt with rock concerts and changes of football matches in the past, but this year has prepared a test pitch with a Christmas parade instead of Sheffield Shield games as a prelude.“We are fortunate enough to be able to give Australia center field training on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, so that was our only preparation, and it seemed to go really well, the feedback was positive. We have the recipe that seems to work… we are simply sticking to the game plan.” More than anything else, those sessions in the middle of the field are shaping up as an invaluable competitive advantage for the members of the Australian team who arrived before those who played for Australia A against the Indians on a different surface at the SCG, something Paine did not hesitate to affirm.“One thing we’ve learned with Covid is to be more in the present,” Hough said. “We like to plan months in advance. We still had plans, but we had to live in the moment a little more,” he said. “[A U2 concert last year] was a much bigger challenge than what we’re going through this year. I never thought I’d see a Christmas parade at the Adelaide Oval, so it’s a unique year.”
Damian Hough
“But we certainly have implemented plans that have worked well against him in the past; hopefully, they work early enough this week, but if not, yes, we have a couple of different plans. The good thing with our attack is that they’re all different, we also have Nathan Lyon and now you bowl Greeny, we have some different angles, some different speeds and obviously Nathan’s spin, as well as Marnus, so we have a lot of different options to bowl at him if he were to come in and settle.” There is something refreshing about tactical discussions and plans on the eve of a test series, rather than Covid protocols, border restrictions and the financial impacts of the year to date. Paine, who appreciates his test career more than most after being one or two phone calls away from retiring from cricket altogether in 2017, had no idea of “bubble fatigue” at this point, when asked if such considerations could shorten what remains of his time at the top of the game. “Absolutely not. I love it, to be honest,” Paine said. “I don’t think this hub has been as strict as perhaps the IPL or the one in England. I sleep very well at night; my children are at home, which is good in a way, but I certainly miss them. But I sleep better here and feel fresher here than at home, so life in the hub could actually make me play longer, if anything.” You don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone. If there has been a touch of fatigue on the frequency of meetings between India and Australia in recent times, the events of 2020 have ensured that this latest chapter is as vivid as any sporting competition can be when so many around the world remain locked down by a pandemic.“Everyone has big plans to get the best players out, don’t they? But that’s the reason they’re the best, they can adapt, they can change with what you’re doing, and Virat is certainly one of the best players, if not the best player in the world,” Paine said. “There’s going to be a moment in this, well, there’s really only one test, so hopefully not, but when you play against players as good as Virat, sometimes they get away from you, that’s the game.”
Tim Paine
