India ‘A’ skipper Hardik Pandya not taking the Australia warm up game lightly

At 22, Hardik Pandya has been named as the Indian skipper of a side that will face up to the might of Australia before Steve Smith’s men actually get down to work with Virat Kohli and his band of merry men. While this remains to be continued, the fact is that the likes of Hardik Pandya will be looking at this as perhaps the perfect opportunity to break into the Indian team in the near future.

Speaking to the Times of India, Pandya went on to state that it would be the perfect time for someone like him to break into the Indian cricket team with no fast-bowling all-rounder in place as well. He also went on to state that he hadn’t played against Australia in a Test match barring the few T20Is he had previously played.

“It will be good opportunity for all of us, specially me to perform and get the opportunity to play in the Test series, it will be a good opportunity for the youngsters as well, who are there to show what they have,” Hardik told reporters here. We are not treating it as a practice game, it’s an opportunity for all of us to do something amazing and get recognized in the selectors’ eyes.”

“I have played against Australia A. This will be an amazing experience. Australians, you all know how they are and how aggressive they are, it will be nice competition for all of us,” he added. “I feel its a learning curve for me, I should be learning lots of things staying with the team and it always helps. I am improving my game day by day. That was the only reason that I thought I made a comeback after a poor IPL. I want to focus on improving my game,” he said.

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Pandya concluded by stating that it was indeed an honor to play for the national side, something that comes very rarely for players these days.

“To play for national team, you need to get used to that (switch to different formats) as I am getting used to it. We played England series and after 4-5 days we played the Bangladesh game,” he said. “It is difficult, but it is about the mental thing, how you work, because the legends which are playing right now, are doing it for years. We should also learn, things won’t be easy and mentally people in this team (India A) are strong and they are going to get used to conditions.”