India ‘A’ opener Abhinav Mukund felt that any lead above 150 will be tough to chase on the final day.
“There is big rough that has formed for the left-handers. So I think we can exploit that. We have four wickets in hand. The ones who are batting are actually good batsmen. If we get anything above 150 it’s going to be tough.”
Abhinav, who took 163 balls for his 59, said that it was a conscious decision on his part to hold one end up.
“My strength is to play for a long time. I wanted to play forward and not against the spin. I thought if I can hold one end up it would be easy for the other batsmen especially with two left arm spinners operating.”
In between there were a few words exchanged with ‘keeper Mathew Wade too, but Abhinav played it down.
“Nothing big. It was about a close lbw decision. They usually talk and I like to talk back [laughs].”
On his part, Aussie skipper Usman Khawaja said his team had the advantage going into the final day.
“I like to think so. They are now effectively 50 for five. We didn’t bowl well in the middle overs but credit to the Indians because they batted well. But I still think we are good at this moment. If we have a good first session, we can chase these runs down. So it is pretty simple from our point of view.”
