Cheteshwar Pujara made 56 in 211 balls on the 5th day at the Brisbane Cricket Ground. He was hit several times during the course of the innings, and on a few of those occasions, he allowed himself to be hit. Cricket Australia’s YouTube service has published a compilation of these blows. We also have ESPNCricinfo’s contemporaneous ball-by-ball commentary record of the innings. Pujara was hit by both Cummins and Hazlewood during this innings. Cummins was particularly lethal in his spell either side of Lunch.
1. 32.5 A short pitched ball from Pat Cummins which moved from off-to-leg after pitching. Normally, Pujara would have stayed side on and swayed out of the line, letting the ball pass him, nose-high, on the 4th stump. The fact that this one passed his forearm guard and shoulder, took the helmet and fell safe (and thankfully didn’t hurt him), and didn’t take the glove on the way to the helmet and go to hand was a matter of Pujara’s good fortune. As it happened, the ball landed safely between short-leg and leg-gully and rolled away towards the boundary, but Pujara didn’t take the leg-bye.
2. 34.3 The length is slightly fuller than the previous delivery and Pujara tries to duck, but doesn’t evade the ball entirely. Ball flies to the keeper, who parries and fields.
3. 34.5 This one is a fraction shorter than the previous one, but doesn’t rise as much, and holds its line instead of moving from off to leg. Pujara turns away from it again. This one passes Pujara just above the glove and carries to the keeper. Appeal. Not out. The batsman does not trust the bounce on the 5th day pitch. A lot of fortune involved in this ball as well.
4. 36.2 This one is much fuller. Beats the inside edge and hits Pujara on the mid-riff. Its less obviously violent than the other deliveries, but an inside edge from this would probably have popped up to short-leg.
5. 36.5 Short of a length, lifter. Pujara fends, ball lands safe. As with most of the other deliveries, on another day, it would have taken the glove and gone to hand.
6. 43.1 Off the thigh-pad from Starc. Misses the inside edge. By the standards of the other deliveries from Cummins, this is a less threatening line and length, and is almost benign. Pujara could still be out caught at short-leg on another day. Batsmen have always been. His unwillingness to pull leaves him with few options against this line and length.
7. 44.3 Pujara takes this one from Hazlewood on the arm. Steve Waugh played the pull only very rarely (unusual for an Australian batsman), and used to get into this tangle often. Unlike Pujara who stays side-on when he’s trying to evade, Waugh would go back and across.
8. 48.2 Smacked on the bottom glove by Hazlewood. Another lifter from short of a good length. Fortunately, it fell to the ground and didn’t loop in some direction. Just looking at the picture is painful!
9. 50.5 This time Pujara tries to evade the bouncer by trying to sway out of the line. But the ball nips back off the pitch and follows him. Hit on the helmet!
It was a remarkable period of play in a remarkable innings by a remarkable player. Pujara is both uniquely ill-suited and uniquely well-suited to survive this type of short pitched bowling on this type of uncertain 5th day pitch where the bounce is variable and even worse, the ball moves off the pitch too.
Pujara’s favored approach against short pitched bowling is to stay side-on and sway out of the line of the ball, letting the ball pass on his off-side, or behind him. This gives Pujara a chance to defend with the bat if the ball stays low because he’s watching the ball all the way. But when line of the ball changes so unreliably (in ways which even the bowler does not intend), Pujara is often left in no-man’s land and has little option but to turn away from the ball. Pujara also does not hook (he also doesn’t sweep against the spinner), so the option available to Rahane, Gill, Kohli, Pant and Rohit Sharma is not available to him. This makes his method uniquely ill-suited to these conditions.
What makes him uniquely well-suited though, is his iron professional discipline. He has the top player’s ability to play each ball as if it is the only one. He rarely loses his shape. He’s almost never drawn into an uncharacteristic stroke. The fact that you don’t see Pujara attempt a hook out of nowhere, or chase a wide one, or try to force something off the back foot, is due to the fact that his method, for better or worse, is his method. By staying side-on, he’s able to defend his off-stump better than most players.
Against fast bowling, unless he’s offered a free hit, he’s unlikely to score. A free-hit is basically either a half volley (hence the abundance of straight drives and cover-drives, but not square drives in Pujara’s highlights reels in Australia), or a long-hop outside off-stump (hence the square cuts and upper cuts), or something on his pads. Against Cummins and Hazlewood, it can be a very long wait for a free hit. Pujara made 33/2(199) against Hazlewood in the series, and 55/5(255) against Cummins. The wait is not as long against the more attacking Mitchell Starc. Pujara took 60/0(173) against him.
Ajinkya Rahane, who is prepared to hook, took 74/2(138) against Cummins, 47/1(100) against Hazlewood and 66/2(101) against Starc in the series. Shubman Gill took 91/0(94) against Starc, 59/3(130) against Cummins and 51/1(107) against Hazlewood.
Cheteshwar Pujara is the very antithesis of the classic number 3 batsman who is often imagined, especially in Australia and England, as the best attacking batsman in the side. He’s stolid, even strokeless, and mighty hard to shift. His disciplined method can be maddening, and on many days, it appears as if he’s defending balls which other batsmen would hit for runs. But that’s the essence of Pujara. Unless its something he can hit, he waits. Sometimes he gets caught in bad positions, but if he survives, he continues to wait. On days like the 5th day at the Brisbane Cricket Grounds, that is worth a lot of exciting hook shots and on-the-rise cover drives.
On another day, any one of those deliveries might have dismissed Pujara. But on this day, he survived them all.
Very good analysis. He has taken the responsibility of holding up one end from the inimitable Rahul Dravid, though Dravid has a greater repertoire of strokes - all classy, stylish and elegant.