Usman Khawaja remains wary of spin challenge against India, praises star India spinner ahead of series opener

The man in form for Australia, opener Usman Khawaja is aware of the challenge he is getting into. Despite having form on his side, the left-handed batter isn’t discounting the spin-heavy Indian bowling line-up in their own conditions. Speaking with The Sydney Morning Herald, Khawaja showered praises on ace Indian spinner Ravichandran Ashwin, calling him a gun. Having played against Ashwin in the past, Khawaja knows a bit or two about his tricks and how he’s going to use it. Ashwin had been a thorn in the flesh of the Aussies;in 18 Tests played in the Border-Gavaskar series throughout, Ashwin has picked up 89 wickets at an average of 31.48. Usman, who will be playing a Test in India for the first time, said Ashwin uses his crease very well that helps him pick wickets.

"Ashwin is a gun. He's very skillful, he's got a lot of tricky little variations, and he uses the crease quite well too. If you asked me the same question when I was younger, I probably wouldn't have been able to answer a lot of things because I didn't really learn about how to face what off-spinners are doing," Usman Khawaja was quoted as saying by The Sydney Morning Herald.

Adding that the wickets in India are sure to turn from day one itself and knowing that Ashwin will come into play very soon in every game, Khawaja said he needs to figure on how to play him and score runs against him.

"But it's one of those really good challenges. The wicket's going to turn here at some point, whether day one, day three, or day four, and he's going to be in the game and bowl a lot of overs. So it's all about figuring out how I'm going to play against him, how I'm going to score runs against him, what he might do. If you bat a long time against him, he's going to change his game plans against you," Khawaja added.

Meanwhile, in their build-up to the 2023 Border-Gavaskar series, Australia decided not to playthe tour game citing the pitches on offer during practice matches are quite different from the ones that used during the actual Tests, eventually leading to no useful training for the touring teams. Now, ahead of the first Test that begins in Nagpur on February 9th, the Aussie team is occupied in the pre-series camp near Bengaluru where they are practicing on dry surfaces.