Australian speed merchant Mitchell Starc feels that the upcoming Border-Gavaskar series against India will be a chance for the hosts to rectify their mistakes from the series defeat to Virat Kohli’s team at home two summers ago.
Virat Kohli led Team India made history by winning their first Test series on Australian soil in the 2018-19 rubber. Recalling that series, the Australian pacer Starc said that the Indian team were better than Australia in both the aspects be it their batting or bowling during that summer.
“You never want to lose a series and you certainly never want to lose one in Australia,” Mitchell Starc was quoted as saying by ESPN’s The Cricket Monthly.
“India were just better than us throughout the (2018-19) series with bat and ball.
“Sure, we haven’t hidden away from that. We needed to be better in all facets of the game and this summer’s certainly a chance to rectify that,” Starc added.
The left-arm seamer talked about how he handles the criticism and revelead earlier he used to get into the noise a bit too much.
“I just felt I probably tuned into the noise too much, and I guess I went from someone who didn’t mind seeing or reading that sort of stuff and taking that as motivation to prove people wrong…”
“Just with having multiple broadcasters and a whole bunch of radio and print and the rest, I probably read into that noise a bit too much,” he said.
Starc is no longer using criticism as motivation to spur him on.
“The expectations on the group, media-wise, were huge. I think I just found it was a lot of unnecessary time spent thinking about it or reading about it.
“Going from someone who saw that as a motivation to prove people wrong, I probably bought into the noise too much, or started digging myself a bigger hole if I wasn’t bowling the way I wanted to.
“Certainly, throughout that series as well I felt like I had 47 different bowling coaches at one point and all these different opinions that I just didn’t need to listen to,” said Starc.
Starc revealed he deactivated his social media accounts after the 2018/19 Test series against India and stopped caring about people’s opinion.
“Since then (last home Test series against India) I’ve basically gotten off Twitter and not (been) reading anything really, and not really caring what other people’s opinions are.
“It’s just had me in a clearer mindset to focus on what I can control and bowl the way I want to bowl.
“That’s certainly how I’ve approached it since and having people I trust around me, whether it’s talking to Alyssa (Healy, his partner) or having conversations with ‘Dre (Andre Adams, NSW bowling coach) or the staff around the group, or the players,” Starc concluded.
The first Test match between India and Australia will be played on December 17 at Adelaide Oval, where the visitors will look retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy again.
Australia Test Squad:
Tim Paine (c), Sean Abbott, Joe Burns, Pat Cummins, Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Michael Neser, James Pattinson, Will Pucovski, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Mitchell Swepson, Matthew Wade, David Warner.