Although Australia lead 2-0 in their Test series against Pakistan, they will not be high on confidence before the tour of India next month.
Their struggles in Asia in the recent past are well documented. They were whitewashed by Sri Lanka in a three-Test series in 2016.
The men from Down Under also had a tour to forget when they played a Test series in India in 2013, losing all four Tests of the series. In fact, they have lost the last seven Tests that they have played in India.
To prepare themselves better this time around, the Aussies are set to practice at the International Cricket Council (ICC) Academy in Dubai to get accustomed to the pitches that are likely to be on offer when they visit India.
The ICC Academy has 30 different pitches, with different soil from all over the world. In the recent Test series between India and England, the pitches differed from match-to-match and that is something that the Australians have taken note of.
Speaking to Fairfax Media, Pat Howard – who is the high performance general manager at Cricket Australia – was aware that it won’t necessarily be a replica of what is to come in India.
“India is not going to be the same everywhere. What they can do in Dubai is do a lot of different preparation with different types of pitches,” said Howard
“The ICC have done a really good job where they’ll have different pitches of the cities. So it’s not just spin pitches, there are different types.
“We cannot copy what we are going to get. It’s all about the mindset that we’re going to adapt. We can’t get practice against (Ravichandran) Ashwin and (Ravindra) Jadeja either.”
Australia will arrive in India for a four-Test series with the first Test scheduled to begin on February 23, 2017 in Pune.
