Indian all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja has been on a roll ever since he made a comeback in a four-match Test series against Australia. Such was Jadeja’s impact in both the Test matches against Australia, that the Rajkot boy was adjudged Player of the Match in both games.
Apart from Jadeja, Team India has been blessed with yet another all-rounder whose performance has made a lot of noise. Axar Patel produced a clinical show in both games, but mostly with the bat. While Axar has made immense contributions with the bat, he didn’t get much to bowl in both games.
With 158 runs in two Test matches, Axar Patel is currently the second leading run-getter in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, after Rohit Sharma, but he has only bowled 26 overs in both games.
After Team India retained Border-Gavaskar Trophy on Sunday evening by beating the visitors in the second Test match, Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel got candid for bcci.tv. In a video shared by BCCI, Axar asked Jadeja if he is bowling well just to keep him away from the bowling crease.
“Sir, meri to bowling aa nahi rahi hai. Axar ko bowling nahi dena hai isliye aisa ball dal rahe ho kya? (Sir, are you bowling like this so that Axar doesn’t get a chance to bowl?),” Axar asked Jadeja, as the duo burst into laughter.
In response, Jadeja explained that the Australians prefer playing the sweep and reverse sweep. “My effort was to bowl stump to stump. If they miss and the ball stays low, then the ball is bound to hit the stumps. That’s what happened today when five balls hit the stumps,” Jadeja said.
Ravindra Jadeja hunted down seven Australian batters in the second game while he bagged three wickets in the 1st innings. He is currently the leading wicket-taker in the series with 17 wickets in two Test matches, while R Ashwin is second in the chart with 14 wickets.