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When I hit Will Pucovski in the helmet I was scared, Australia was a learning experience
"The first thing that struck me at the nets was the discipline and the intensity of the sessions. Every player knew his skills and what they need to do," says Kartik Tyagi.
It’s been over a week now since I returned from Australia but some images from the tour keep coming back. Being part of the dressing room during tense chases, the jokes, the series of injuries and then the victory, I couldn’t have asked for more on my maiden trip with the senior team.
I got to know that I would be travelling with the Indian team as a net bowler during the IPL. I was with the Rajasthan Royals and had bowled to most of the guys in the squad during the tournament. But to be part of same travelling brigade as part of the senior group as a 20-year-old was something else.
The first thing that struck me at the nets was the discipline and the intensity of the sessions. Every player knew his skills and what they need to do. Even though I was a net bowler, Bharat Arun and Jasprit Bumrah kept coming to me and advised me how to bowl against a particular batsman, and making the margin of error less. Bowling to Virat Kohli was particularly challenging. He takes the practice sessions as a task. He likes to dominate the bowlers there too.
Off the field, there was not much to do in IPL apart from spending time with teammates within the hotel as part of the rule but in Australia, we could go out. Wriddhiman Saha was a great company for me. He is quite senior and from the outside it might seem he is a very serious, but off the field his sense of humour becomes clear.
That is a major characteristic of the players in this team. Their attitude makes them what they are. Like after the Adelaide Test, there was gloom but the group did not take long to move on. Jo ho gaya so ho gaya type. As a youngster that is a great learning - not to brood too much one the bad days but take it as learning process.
From the outside, it would seem that during an intense session of a Test match everybody would be all hooked on and talk serious stuff about the game. But it is not always so. Like when Hanuma Vihari and R Ashwin were batting in Sydney, there was joke going on in the dressing room that if they can stay in the crease for so long, we can also continue to stay at the same seat for the entire duration of the innings. We were told not to move from our places. What if the partnership breaks!
The surprising part for me was that these were the senior players and they could switch on and off from the game so quickly. Their discipline was astounding.
Everything was not hunky dory for me though. I hit Will Pucovski on the helmet during a warm-up game ahead of the first Test and then hit Mayank Agarwal again in the nets. I was quite scared on both occasions to be honest as already so many players were getting ruled out during the series. Thankfully, nothing major happened to both of them.
Bowlers like T Natarajan and Shardul Thakur made their debut after entering the Test squad as net bowlers. Frankly, it never came across my mind that I could have also made my debut with so many injuries happening. That’s not the right attitude. I was just happy to be watching the Test series live in person while most of the world was watching it on TV.
I will carry this experience going forward. There are several domestic tournaments and the last three months with the Indian team will fuel my ambitions going forward.
As told to Abhishek Paul
(Kartik Tyagi was part of the India team at the 2020 U-19 World Cup. Subsequent performances at the IPL 2020 earned him a call-up as an additional fast bowler in the Australia tour)
