India will have a difficult time making it to a second straight World Test Championship final. While Sri Lanka is now in third place on the WTC final table, South Africa and Australia are their main competitors for that position. India must make sure that they win the majority of their remaining six games and do not lose any.
By seizing control of the opening Test against Bangladesh in Chattogram on Day 4, India has launched their decisive bid for the position. In response to India's 513-run target, the hosts are already on 260/6. Rahul Dravid, the team's head coach, has said that they are simply taking each test as it comes and are not planning too far ahead.
“It is one step at a time. I don't think we can start looking at the sixth one before we start here. We have got to win this one first. We have to play our best cricket to give ourselves a chance and then go to Dhaka and replicate. Just take it as we go,” said Dravid in an interview on BCCI.tv.
India will play four of their games at home against Australia. Australia will also host South Africa in a three-match Test series that got underway on Saturday.
In particular, Australia, which will have the tough challenge of hosting India, the current top two could experience significant drops in win percentage in the following months.
Since 2015, Australia has not been able to overcome India in a Test series, either at home or away.
Dravid advised KL Rahul and co to focus on this game first before monitoring how the cards fall and deciding what to do in the series against Australia.
“We know we have a challenge in our hands, we have to win a majority of the games we have left in the championship. But we are not going to get there if we don't take the first steps well. We have to focus on this one and then see how the cards fall and then we will see what we have to do in the series against Australia,” said Dravid.
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