Published: Sep 14, 2016, 04:38 PM (IST)
Edited: Sep 14, 2016, 04:38 PM (IST)
Australia opener Usman Khawaja is not ready to think about his failure in Sri Lanka and is concentrating on the upcoming Australian summer. After a horrific Test series in Sri Lanka, Australia managed to win the limited-overs series but Khawaja was not able to do anything significant. The player said that though their performance as a whole has not been impressive in Sri Lanka, he wants to shrug all off and concentrate on what is on the cards. He also said he needs good runs and then only can think of playing India. READ: Chris Rogers wants Shaun Marsh as Warner’s partner in Tests for Australia
Talking to espncricinfo.com, the player said, “I will look at that (performance against spin) but…I want to concentrate on this summer in Australia ahead. There is no point looking at India if I don’t score any runs in the summer here and if we don’t win games against the current opposition we’ve got coming. If that bridge comes or when it comes, I’ll look at it.
“I’ve already sort of assessed Sri Lanka, I’m sure all of us have. We have as a group. But us moving forward we need to win at home first. We’re playing against two quality attacks. They’re very good teams so first and foremost we need to do well there and once we can tick those boxes off we can start looking at India again. I’m sure everyone will have a think about it over the summer.”
“As a whole, we probably just didn’t adapt to the wickets quickly enough. I honestly think we should have won that first Test match. If it wasn’t for the little fella, the youngster Mendis playing an absolutely unbelievable innings and getting that hundred…that sort of took the game away from us. I firmly believe that if we won that first Test everything would have been a lot different. We obviously didn’t, then Galle happened, and Sri Lanka just outplayed us,” he added.
He also spoke about being dropped in the last Test match. “It was tough to not play that last Test match. It’s never easy being dropped, no matter what the circumstances are. But there’s so much cricket still to come. I don’t feel like I’ve lost touch or I’m out of it. Hopefully for me right now it’s just about going back to Matador Cup and doing well for Queensland. Hopefully we can win a trophy, and then hopefully I can be there for the first Test in Perth.”
However, he did not comment on his interaction with the selectors. “I don’t particularly want to chat about it because it was between myself and the selectors and the coach. I’m sure if they want to say something, they can. It didn’t seem like it was the end of the world. I can understand where they were coming from, even though it was disappointing and I didn’t fully agree with it. At the end of the day it’s out of your hands. You’ve just got to roll with the punches and hopefully when you get another chance you score runs.”
