Australia head coach Andrew McDonald has showered rich praise on Virat Kohli, saying that the veteran India batter played a blinder of a knock on Day 4 of the fourth Border-Gavaskar Trophy Test at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.
Kohli slammed 186 off 364 balls, helping the hosts take a sizeable first-innings lead of 91 runs. With this knock, the former Indian skipper also ended his much-talked-about century drought in the longest format of the game. It was the 28th hundred of his Test career and his first since November 2019.
Speaking ahead of Day 5, McDonald said the visitors still have a lot to play for while also acknowledging that India batted really well on the penultimate day of the final Test match.
The Aussies did well to survive six overs without losing a wicket in their second innings. They ended Day 4 at 3/0, trailing the home team by 88 runs.
“There’s still a lot to play for, especially when you are playing for the Australian national team. I thought India batted well yesterday, we're still trailing by 88 runs, so we've got to go out and put the runs on the board and eat out the deficit, but we're primed considering the way we batted in the first innings,” the Australian coach told Star Sports.
“There were a lot of positives, we were ahead in Delhi, unfortunately one bad hour cost us. But we backed it up in Indore and were able to put India away. We batted first here, wasn't a typical Indian wicket, but having won the toss, I thought we missed an opportunity to put up 600 runs on the board. Virat played a blinder yesterday to put them ahead,” he added.
McDonald also provided an injury update on Usman Khawaja, saying that the opening batter is still being assessed.
“Khawaja is being assessed, he's been at the nets this morning, it's looking positive at this stage, but we've got some work to do this morning (in terms of getting him completely fit),” he said.
India currently lead the four-match Test series 2-1. If the Ahmedabad Test ends in a draw, the Rohit Sharma-led side will be declared winner of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2023.
