Pujara and the perils of being a specialist

What makes his poor run most evident is that Pujara is a Test specialist; perhaps the only true specialist in the Indian team as Ajinkya Rahane, R Ashwin and Ishant Sharma (men who aren’t white-ball cricketers anymore for India) all regularly play in the IPL.

Given his extended run of poor form, the overhead conditions at Headingley on the morning of the third Test and the fact that his captain had won a rare toss, Cheteshwar Pujara perhaps would’ve hoped to walk in to bat after an England innings; then too after the Indian openers had had a long enough say. Instead, Virat Kohli put India in, KL Rahul drove at an away swinger in the first over and there the No.3 was, marking his guard to face a new ball that was five deliveries old.

India's Cheteshwar Pujara walks off the field after losing his wicket during the first day of third test cricket match between England and India, at Headingley cricket ground in Leeds, England, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021. (AP Photo/Jon Super)(AP)

Significantly the bowler was James Anderson, Pujara’s foremost pace nemesis in Test cricket—having dismissed him on nine occasions before this innings. Before this Test in Leeds, only Australia’s Nathan Lyon was more successful against the 33-year-old, with 10 Pujara dismissals to his credit. Anderson was about to catch up.

Pujara did well to see off the last ball of the opening over, which was full in length, and he did even better to last the entirety of Anderson’s following over, where the great fast bowler constantly tested the batsman’s skill against the in-shaping delivery. But when Anderson began his third over with a ball that swung away, Pujara nicked it to the keeper and just like that after just nine balls (eight of them by Anderson), his innings was over. In many ways, so was the goodwill he had earned during the previous Test.

Without his defiant knock in the second innings at Lord’s, India could well have been in danger of losing that game—a diametrically opposite scenario from the eventual result. In that high-pressure situation, Pujara’s 45 was worth a hundred, but for the record books it doesn’t even amount to a fifty. Hence, after the first innings in Leeds, the bitter truth is that Pujara has now gone 12 innings in a row without a half-century. The streak of not scoring a hundred stretches back a whole lot longer to January 2019, when he almost single-handedly gave India their first Test series win in Australia. But that’s over two-and-a-half years ago.

What makes his poor run most evident is that Pujara is a Test specialist; perhaps the only true specialist in the Indian team as Ajinkya Rahane, R Ashwin and Ishant Sharma (men who aren’t white-ball cricketers anymore for India) all regularly play in the IPL. Pujara last featured in an IPL game back in 2014, and hasn’t played domestic cricket either for nearly two years due to the coronavirus pandemic. So, in an era of all-format cricketers who have the luxury of rediscovering lost form quickly in one format or the other, Pujara only has Test cricket. And for a while now, the disadvantages of being a specialist seem to outweigh the benefits.

Since Pujara’s Sydney hundred in the first week of 2019, no one has played in more red-ball matches for India than Pujara and Rahane—21 Tests each. In this ongoing period, Rahane (who too has felt the pinch of oscillating form) has struck three tons and averages a shade over 40 while Pujara averages 26.83. To put that average in perspective, the 912 runs Pujara has scored since Sydney has taken 21 Tests; in the same period Mayank Agarwal has notched nearly as many runs (857) in just 12 Tests.

But just as easily forgotten are Pujara’s moments of valour during his toughest phase as a Test specialist. If not for his twin fifties (50 and 77) in Sydney this year, India would not have been able to save the penultimate Test of the series in Australia. And if not for his second innings 56 in the final Test in Brisbane, India wouldn’t have been able to pull off one of their greatest Test wins. The limelight fell on all the other heroes, even as the focus on Pujara has since turned into a harsh glare.

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