Border Gavaskar Trophy: The Indian cricket team is going to face Australia in a four-match Test series from 9 February. The atmosphere has already heated up before this series and the process of statements is going on. Constant players are giving statements before this series. Meanwhile, Australia’s great batsman Steve Smith has given a big statement before this series.

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Big Statement of Steve Smith

Former Australia captain Steve Smith says his team is better off practicing alone rather than playing warm-up matches on “irrelevant” Indian pitches ahead of the four-Test Border-Gavaskar series. Australia has decided not to play a single warm-up match in India during the month-long Test series. The main reason for this is that the host nation would provide grass wickets for practice while spin-friendly pitches would be prepared for the actual matches. Steve Smith, who on Monday won the country’s men’s player of the year award for the fourth time in his career, said his team would benefit more from a net session than a practice match.

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BCCI Accused

The 18-member squad, led by Pat Cummins, held a camp on spin-friendly pitches in Sydney ahead of the series and will have a week’s practice in Bengaluru ahead of the first Test starting February 9 in Nagpur. Before the team left for India on Monday, ‘News.com.au’ quoted Steve Smith as saying, “We usually play two practice matches in England. There is no practice match in India this time. “He said,” Last time we were there (in India) I am pretty sure we got grass wickets (to practice) and it was irrelevant. Hopefully we will get really good training facilities where the ball is expected to do what it is expected to do on the pitch.

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Australia Refuses to Play Practice Match

Smith beat Travis Head and David Warner to win the Allan Border Medal. Australia has been criticized for not including a warm-up match on the tour of India as it is an integral part of a longer series. Steve Smith, however, said that tougher net sessions would help the spinners practice better. “It is better that we practice in our nets and spinners get a chance to bowl as much as they want,” he said.

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Steve Smith’s team had to face a 1-2 defeat on the tour of India in 2017. He indicated that the decision was taken after a lot of thought. He said, “We will wait and see when we get on the field. I think we have taken the right decision not to play the warm-up matches. Like I said, last time they prepared a grass pitch for us (for the practice match) and we hardly faced the spinners so it is irrelevant. The Australian team held training sessions on those pitches in Sydney last week Where there were cracks like Indian pitches.

Smith said, “This (Test series in India) is definitely a very big series. I don’t know whether this (victory in India) is the final frontier. I’ve never won there, I’ve been there twice (for Tests), it’s always difficult to play there. We have some challenges ahead but the players are ready for it.