Having seen him announce his arrival at the Test level against West Indies recently, batting great Brian Lara believes that young prodigy Prithvi Shaw has the talent, ability and more importantly, the mental strength to do well in the upcoming Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Australia, starting December 6. 

Shaw followed his free-flowing 134 on debut at Rajkot with another dominating knock of 70 in the first innings at Hyderabad, before coming back to finish off the proceedings with 33* in the second. 

Amassing 237 runs at an average of 118.50 across three innings and earned Man of the Series award for his outstanding exploits. It is the confidence and excellent temperament which shined through from Shaw and he reiterated his status as the one to definitely watch out for in the future.

This is where everyone is excited to see how the 18-year-old goes about his first real stiff challenge at the highest stage, including the mighty Lara. 

"Any youngster looking to do well in Australia has to embrace the challenge," said Lara, "If you look at someone like Prithvi for instance — everyone is already talking about how he is going to do on bouncier wickets. He has the inner mental strength that holds a player in good stead," and emphasized from his own experience, "Your technique will adapt to the conditions if you are mentally strong,  without that,  you'll fail."

"I saw Shaw batting against the West Indies quicks who were bowling at speeds in excess of 140 and he looked pretty solid," but added, "That said, if he doesn't have a good tour Down Under,  doesn't mean he won't have a good career."

Lara also spoke about the dominating Virat Kohli, who he feels "is ticking all the right boxes" towards greatness, and said, "It looks like he is never going to experience fatigue. And if he does run out of steam,  he can always take a break, as he has done with the T20 series against West Indies. His numbers are mainly because of his focus. He's not shying away from any challenge."

"And that's important for any young player. A player like that,  with his passion and commitment,  has shown that he can excel at things outside his comfort zone," he signed off. 

(Inputs from Sportstar)