Cheteshwar Pujara: Axar is a left-hander, so he was sent at number 4 to tackle left-arm spinners

Indian batter Cheteshwar Pujara hailed the move to send Axar Patel up the order in the second innings of second Test match against Bangladesh in Dhaka.

Axar Patel was sent in to bat after India lost KL Rahul and Shubman Gill early in their run chase on Day 3. The left-handed all-rounder didn’t disappoint and stood till the end of the day adding 26 crucial runs even as more wickets kept falling at the other end.

Pujara said that the idea was to tackle Bangladesh’s left-arm spinners.

“It was a very good move because among their three strike bowlers, two were left-arm spinners. Axar is a left-hander, so he was sent to tackle them and to have a batter who can bat sensibly in the initial period against the Kookaburra ball. It was a crucial move for us,” Pujara said during the post-match presentation.

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India lost four wickets for 45 runs in the last session on Day 3 while chasing a modest total of 145. Axar played a crucial role late in the evening as he was able to hold one end while Pujara and Virat Kohli were dismissed at the other. The southpaw also hit several boundaries to keep the scorecard ticking.

“That was an important phase of the game where we didn’t want to lose too many wickets in the evening, and he could have batted cautiously. So I was not surprised. When you are chasing a 145-run total, every run is important, and the way he batted, his innings was very valuable for us,” Pujara added.

Pujara didn’t score well in the final innings but was adjudged to be the player of the series for being the highest run-scorer with 222 runs in four innings. Pujara also scored a vital and his fastest century in the first Test.

Pujara looked back at his dismissal (stumped out) and said he was unfortunate.

“The way I was batting in this series, it was a slightly unfortunate dismissal in the first innings as well, I was quite confident about playing on this wicket. Yesterday also I was slightly unfortunate, I got an inside edge, and the ball hit my inner thigh and went to the keeper. I was slightly late to react,” said Pujara.

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He went on say that credit goes to Bangladesh for taking the match to the wire. Mehidy Hasan was the wrecker-in-chief as he bagged a five-wicket haul and put India constantly on the back foot until Shreyas Iyer and Ravichandran Ashwin countered the bowlers to cruise through for victory.

“The situation was quite ideal. I was feeling that the way I have been batting, if we had not lost too many wickets in that one hour, had scored 60-70 for the loss of one or two wickets, the match would have turned in our favour yesterday itself, but credit goes to the Bangladesh team for the way they bowled.”

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