Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2023: Scott Boland confident on making selectors' job 'tough'

The Australian speedster, Scott Boland, is hopeful he has been able to cement his place in the current Australian squad for the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2023, after his performance in the opening Test against India. Though, the pitch was spin friendly, Boland kept it tight and bowled in good areas along with line and length from one end.

Notably, Boland's remained wicketless in his bowling spell, which consisted of 17 overs in which he only conceded 34 runs along with 4 maiden overs. Going by his economy rate of just 2.00, we can safely say that he remained frugal in giving any easy runs to the opposition.

Scott Boland got a game to play in the opening Test, provided Mitchell Starc is yet to fully recover from his finger injury, which he suffered in December 2022, and Josh Hazlewood suffering an Achilles injury, which ruled him out from first first Test as well.

Hope I made their job tough: Scott Boland confident he has made a mark for his team

Courtesy of his accurate bowling, Scott Boland reflected on his performance in the first Test on a pitch where most of his team-mates were battered along with his chances ahead.

"I felt like I bowled well, but when you are bringing in someone like Mitchell Starc, who is a gun in these conditions and has bowled really well in Sri Lanka and Pakistan, hopefully, I made the selectors job a little bit tougher than what it originally was," Boland stated.

"In places like here, it is tough to judge [how you went] as a fast bowler but I think I contributed to our game plan and I played my role pretty well. I think I had a pretty good spell in conjunction with Toddy a couple of times so I was happy with how the ball came out," the 33-year-old told cricket.com.au.

The right-handed pacer stated that he is very well aware of the amount of strong competition within the team, especially with the World Test Championship finals race gaining heat, and he believes it is extremely important for him to make the most out of every single opportunity that comes his way. Boland went on to state that he knows how important a player Starc is for Australia, and he would definitely want him to get back to the team as fast as possible. He however, stated the management still wasn't sure about Starc's availability.

“We don’t know. I’m not sure. I haven’t seen Starcy bowl. I’m not sure if he’s going to be right to play. I assume he is if he’s over here. I don’t think we’re going to play three fast bowlers. There’s only going to be two spots up for grabs, I reckon."

Boland on an ending note expressed his desire to play the second Test, which will be played in Delhi, and he hopes the selector's will find it tough to look beyond him.

"Obviously I want to play. I enjoyed the challenge of bowling in these different conditions. I've just got to make the selectors' job as hard as I can to bring someone in," he signed off.

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