Having helped Australia A get a sizable lead in the second unofficial 'Test' against India A with his strokeful 150 on Day 2, Australia A opener Cameron Bancroft today said that they learnt a thing or two from the Indian batting failure in the first innings.
The Cheteshwar Pujara-led side crashed to 135 on the opening day of the four-day game and the visitors responded with a strong 329 for nine, gaining a 194-run lead so far.
"Having watched them go through as a team, I definitely thought we have to come out positive and stick to wicket to score runs. What we generally want to do is to be confident and put pressure on the opposition. We learnt that after watching India bat in the first innings," Bancroft said.
"We bowled really well according to our plans. We deserved credit for having bowled well and restricting you for 135. It was applying pressure in building dots and maidens. In the context of the game we were on top," he added.
Bancroft was 'patience personified' in his 267-ball stay at the crease and he said that his batting plan worked well.
"I had my own plan of when to come down the wicket and play my sweep shots. I think I had worked on sweep shots specially. It worked pretty well for me," he said.
"If you always look to score runs, I think you need to be focused no matter what wicket you are playing. All our batters were looking to score today and it started building partnerships," he added.
As for help given by Indian batsman Sridharan Sriram, who assisted them as batting consultant, Bancroft said, "We came to know Sriram when we came with the Academy team in early June last year."
"Sriram did few sessions with us and he has been awesome, specially playing defense in sub-continent conditions. He helped me a lot and to be comfortable with balls spinning past about and to be playing the line and playing straight. He has been really good and I have been working hard on playing sweep shots and things like that. He had certainly given me lot of confidence," he added.
Meanwhile star of the day for India A, off-spinner Baba Aparajith (5-74) checked the Australian surge to some extent with his five-wicket haul and was happy with his performance.
"Very happy. I got a bit lucky at the start with the first wicket (Marcus Stoinis). But I was really happy with the way I bowled after that," Aparajith said.
"If it had come a bit earlier I would have been happier. But we had to be patient. We could not have run through them in one session. And we didn't bat to our potential yesterday.
"We bowled well actually. But at one stage we gave too many boundaries. I was partly to blame too. But credit to their batsmen," he added.
