Cricket comment: India’s Cheteshwar Pujara is destiny’s poor child in a stalling career

Everyone is convinced of his resilience and batting abilities but he is unlikely to get a leap of faith from those who matter, writes Dileep Premachandran.

India's Cheteshwar Pujara hits a boundary during the third and final Test cricket match against Sri Lanka in Colombo on August 29, 2015. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte

Cheteshwar Pujara had been considered one for Indian cricket’s future long before he made his Test debut against Australia in October 2010.

He waited patiently for more than six hours for his first chance, as Murali Vijay and Sachin Tendulkar shared a partnership that spanned 90.3 overs, and a Mitchell Johnson delivery that kept very low meant that his first taste of the big time lasted just three minutes.

On the final day, with India chasing a tricky 207 for victory, there was quite a buzz after the fall of Virender Sehwag’s wicket.

Instead of the familiar, reassuring figure of Rahul Dravid at No 3, out walked Pujara.

Dravid was going through something of a run drought, and as at Eden Gardens nearly a decade earlier when VVS Laxman was promoted to No 3, the thinking seemed to be that the new man would offer greater impetus.

It turned out to be an inspired choice. Pujara batted superbly, using his feet brilliantly to Nathan Hauritz, while also taking runs off the pacers.

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By the time he was dismissed for 72 (89 balls), India were well on course for a comfortable win.

He could do little of note in South Africa against a rampant Dale Steyn, and then suffered a terrible knee injury that kept him out of contention for more than a year.

He returned with an innings of 159 against New Zealand, and started the series against England with scores of 206 not out, 41 not out and 135.

In the year that followed, there would be another double-century, against Australia, and hundreds in Sachin Tendulkar’s final Test (Mumbai) and Johannesburg. After 17 Tests, Pujara’s numbers were mind-boggling. He had six hundreds, and averaged 66.25.

And despite the many comparisons with Dravid, who had also been an unflappable young man, Pujara was scoring far quicker, at 52.21 per 100 balls.

He seemed to fathom the pace and rhythms of Test cricket far better than most of his contemporaries.

That was nearly three years ago. In 17 subsequent Tests, Pujara averages 30.75.

The lone hundred in those matches came in Colombo a year ago, when he carried his bat through the innings to set up a series-clinching win.

The tempo has also dropped, with the strike-rate a pedestrian 42.39.

Ravi Shastri, who was India’s team director for 18 months, was one of those who had the make the tough decision to drop Pujara, after three Tests of the 2014-15 tour of Australia.

“The team ethos was quite simple,” Shastri said to Wisden India recently.

“We wanted to move the game along. With him [Pujara] in recent times, you get the impression of a player trying to survive.

“You can’t just wait for the bad ball to come along.”

Shastri, like many others, is however sympathetic to the plight of a player who has clearly been stereotyped as a long-form player.

He was given five one-day internationals to impress and then dropped, and there was no joy in the IPL either, with all eight franchises ignoring him at the last auction.

The emergence of Ajinkya Rahane and Lokesh Rahul, both of whom have played vital innings in recent times, has further queered the pitch for Pujara, who is far from certain of his place in the next two Test matches in the Caribbean.

Shastri remains convinced that one defining innings might be all it takes to kick-start a stalling career, but for the moment it is hard to see where that will come from.

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