Australia were boosted by the return of Cameron Green for the third Test against India in Indore after the all-rounder missed the first two matches but the star batter was unable to show his true abilities. This all changed in the fourth and final match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy when the batter smashed a brilliant 114 off 170 balls in Australia's first innings to score his first century in the longest format of the game.
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After the end of Day 2's play, Cameron's stunning display backed Usman Khawaja's 180, as the visitors set a tough target of 480 runs for India in the first innings.
Speaking at the press conference after stumps, India's Ravichandran Ashwin heaped praise on Green and believes that the young Australian is a once-in-a-generation cricketer and will end up as a wonderful player down the line.
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"I hope you tuned into the IPL auction; it just tells you how the Indian cricketing fraternity rates Cameron Green. I think he's a fantastic player. Just the raw materials for a person as tall as him, lovely levers, good batting sense, can bowl and really hit the deck well and moves pretty well on the field.
"These are once-in-a-generation cricketers you are talking about. We come from different countries – India is very different, we can't protect such players for a long period of time. It performs or perish. But in countries like Australia and England, they're doing pretty well at that. I expect Cameron Green to be a wonderful cricketer down the line," the Indian all-rounder said.
It was Ashwin who got the all-important wicket of Green on Friday, and he revealed his tactics against the 23-year-old all-rounder.
"He's got his strengths and you want to stay away from his strengths. Clearly from what he saw in Australia – I played a practice game against him at Drummoyne Oval in Sydney. From there on, I've been watching him bat, how well he moves to balls outside off, how well he comes down the pitch, how he sweeps the ball when he came to the subcontinent."
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"As a bowler, it's my duty to keep a check on all these things and also try to make a plan to try and make it uncomfortable for him. It was not a pitch where a lot of things were going for me. So I had to use the scrambled seam, drift, whatever was available," the veteran bowler added.
Meanwhile, after the Usman Khawaja-Green batting show on display on Day 2, India showed a sign of counterattack as they are steady on 36 for no loss at the end of the day's play on Friday, March 10. Rohit Sharma (17 off 33) and Gill (18 off 27) gave India a fine start as the host's trail by 444 runs now.
Earlier, Khawaja and Green kept the Australian scoreboard ticking as they stitched together a partnership of 208 runs keeping the Indian bowlers at bay eventually, Axar Patel, and then Ashwin, rescued the side but the damage was already done with the visitors scoring 480 runs in the first innings.
