Michael Neser castles Cheteshwar Pujara with an absolute peach in warm-up game

Back in 2018-19, India won their maiden Test series on Australian soil under the leadership of Virat Kohli. During the tour, the focus was mostly on Kohli due to his massive numbers at the international level. However, more than Kohli, it was Cheteshwar Pujara, who stole the show. The right-hander was the leading run-scorer of the series with 521 runs at a stupendous average of 74.42.

During his journey, he amassed three tons and one fifty with a top score of 193, showing the reason why India depend a lot on his skills in the middle-order. During the series, he smashed 50 fours and two sixes as well. It goes without saying that he’s expected to be a vital cog in India’s setup even in the 2020-21 edition of the Border Gavaskar Trophy, scheduled to start in a few days.

Cheteshwar Pujara failing in the second after fifty in the first innings

The opening Test is set to get underway on December 17 at the Adelaide Oval. It will also be India’s maiden overseas Day-Night Test after their home pink-ball Test against Bangladesh in November 2019. As far as Pujara is concerned, he is currently taking part in the warm-up match against Australia A at the Drummoyne Oval in Sydney and started the game in a reasonable manner.

In the first innings, he showed a great amount of patience and notched 54 runs off 140 balls with the help of five fours. In the end, he got out to fast bowler James Pattinson. In the second innings, however, Pujara couldn’t even open his account. He was castled by Michael Neser with an absolute peach. The fast bowler churned out a back-of-a-length delivery on and around off-stump.

Pujara tried to play a defensive shot, but the delivery opened him up completely. The ball breached the batsman’s outside edge and crashed on to the top of the off-stump. Quite expectantly, Neser and his teammates were delighted after seeing the back of India’s batting stalwart.

Here’s the video-

Beauty! Seam bowling perfection from Michael Neser to knock over Cheteshwar Pujara #AUSAvIND pic.twitter.com/Jy55DzEySh

— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) December 8, 2020

Pujara hasn’t had a lot of cricket to play this year. The Saurashtra cricketer played a couple of Tests back in February during the tour of New Zealand. When the other Indian players were busy playing in the Indian Premier League, Pujara got back to training, keeping in mind India’s upcoming assignments.