“I was lucky to play against him in a Test in India a couple of years ago, but it will be nice to play against him in our backyard,” he said. “He’s a world-class player, but I think we can get on top of him pretty early and hopefully stay on top of him for most of the summer.”
Like several Australian players, Boland highlighted India’s 3-0 loss to New Zealand, but cautioned how much needs to be read into it. The quick visitors did their damage in the first Test before the spinners took control in Pune and Mumbai to secure a famous whitewash.
“There’s a lot more bounce here, more seam,” Boland said. “The way they will structure their team will be completely different from what you see in India.”
“I think sometimes when you play that practice match, we traveled with a team of 19 players and we were only allotted three days,” Rohit said. “And I don’t know how much workload we can do in those three days in terms of preparing everyone.
“So we, as management as well, feel that instead of having that, the match simulation where the batsmen can spend more time in the middle, batting in the middle, and then the bowlers can also bowl a lot of balls, “So that’s something we, as a team, feel more comfortable doing instead of playing a scrimmage because playing time isn’t an issue. “We’ve all been playing a lot of cricket, so it’s just about spending time in between.”
Boland averages 12.21 in home Tests and previously admitted he was hoping for a chance last season that would only be denied by the durability of Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood, helped by none of the matches lasting five days.
He has been recovering from an injury earlier this season after a county deal with Durham was canceled due to a heel problem and bowled out 28 overs in the Sheffield Shield against New South Wales last month. Boland said he was under “a bit of a restriction” in terms of his overs in that match, but did not expect to be stopped for Australia A.
“It seemed like six long months between games,” he said. “I remember being on the field in the Shield game and I was very happy to be playing cricket again. “I haven’t had many injury breaks throughout my career so it was different going through all the rehabilitation.
“Fortunately [we’ve] I have very good physiotherapists and support staff at cricket Victoria. I was very lucky to be able to lean on them, because I rarely thought: ‘[are] Are any of these things getting better? But now everything has gone well and I feel very good.”
