The major attraction of India’s net session at the Adelaide Oval on Sunday was the presence of MS Dhoni. The Indian captain joined the squad in Australia on Friday, and after a day’s rest, was fresh and full of energy, as he sent down a long spell of his seam-up medium pacers in the nets.
Dhoni took turns with Ishant Sharma and Varun Aaron to bowl to Shikhar Dhawan, Murali Vijay and Cheteshwar Pujara at the middle wicket. R Ashwin and Karn Sharma occupied one practice pitch for the entire session while the third one was used by batsmen to face some throw-downs from the support staff.
Ishant and Aaron worked well in tandem, often breaking into a discussion about their bowling in the midst of their long spell. The two worked up a good pace to all the batsmen and had them beaten on several occasions.
Rohit Sharma had his turn in the nets briefly following a one-on-one chat with Duncan Fletcher. The spinners were watched intently by Ravi Shastri, who had many words of advice for the young leg-spinner.
Amidst all the serious work and honing of skills, there was a light moment of hilarity when a delivery in the throw-down net broke Dhawan’s bat into half. The ball landed on back of a length and smacked bang into the middle of Dhawan’s straight bat, taking the lower half of the willow to the ground. There was a roar of cheer around the nets area, which Dhawan acknowledged by raising the remaining part of his bat in the air.
As it happened, Dhoni teased one of the net bowlers saying, “Come on, you too have to break a bat”. A good three hours of nets later, some players had fielding and catching practice on the main ground.
By: BCCI
