Australia skipper Tim Paine likened the fierce Test rivalry with India to the one seen for over a century against England in the Ashes.
Paine's comments came even as concerns grow over the next summer's Border-Gavaskar Trophy amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
The deadly outbreak forced the Australian government to seal its borders and put in place a strict travelling ban for the next six months. So unless the situation improves for the ban to be then revoked, the four-match Test series might be jeopardised.
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"We play Test cricket to win and every Test match now counts to that end goal we're driving to which is the Test Championship final," Cricbuzz quoted Paine as saying. "So, points are really important, Test matches are more important than they've ever been. So, it's not so much about looking back and trying to get them back for what happened last time."
Paine, though, cleared the feeling of anticipation is due to the overall nature of the contest between the two "high-quality sides" and that he isn't seeing it as an opportunity to avenge the previous 2-1 home series loss.
"This is a different team, no doubt their team will be slightly different as well, but it's two high quality teams, a really anticipated series purely because of the quality of cricket, not for what's happened before. India and Australia as a rivalry, it's a series a bit like the Ashes that we all look forward to," he added.
Cheteshwar Pujara was outstanding during the last tour where the likes of Jasprit Bumrah, Ishant Sharma and Mohammad Shami outbowled Pat Cummins, Josh Hazlewood, and Mitchell Starc in India's historic victory. But it remains to be seen whether Virat Kohli's men can replicate that success with the return of David Warner, Steve Smith in expectedly more trying circumstances.
"I think you put in 15,000 Test runs with two guys alone, Steve Smith and David Warner, Marnus Labuschagne's come on in leaps and bounds and he's now a top three or four batsman in the world himself," Paine said.
"You put that amount of runs into a cricket side, last time we didn't have ... we know how good India's bowling line-up is and last time we just weren't quite good enough if we're totally honest against that attack, whereas this time I think we'll be a different kettle of fish. We've got three of the best batsmen in the world in our top six."
(Inputs from Cricbuzz)
