Pant Hit On Body, Kohli Tested In Nets As India Train Behind Black Cloth

Star batter Virat Kohli began preparations ahead of the 1st Test between India and Australia at the Optus Stadium in Perth, starting from November 22. Kohli was seen batting in the nets at the WACA Ground, the other venue in Perth. He was the first Indian player to reach Australia, along with his family. Kohli is aiming to recover from a lean patch, having scored just 93 runs in the recent 0-3 Test loss at home to New Zealand.

However, Kohli enjoys batting on Australian soil. He has played 13 Tests Down Under and scored 1352 runs at an average of 54.08. He has smashed six hundreds and four fifties during the same time, while his career-best score in Australia is 169, which he scored at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 2014.

In a viral video, Kohli was all padded up to face the music on the bouncy practice tracks at WACA.

Virat Kohli during the Practice Session at WACA
- This video is for those who were saying that Virat is not practicing pic.twitter.com/wcWXntc3NE — (@wrognxvirat) November 13, 2024

Virat Kohli has started his Test preparations. He's in the nets along with India's other senior players.

Kohli is looking sharp against some short of a length quick bowling pic.twitter.com/JcTTpza7Ga — Tristan Lavalette (@trislavalette) November 13, 2024

Kohli was the main attraction of India's training session on Wednesday. He was absent from the nets on Tuesday as the likes of Rishabh Pant, Yashasvi Jaiswal and a few others southpaw took on the local quicks.

Kohli was mostly tested by back-of-a-length, full deliveries and looked pretty sharp. Similarly, Pant and Jaiswal also batted aggressively on Tuesday.

However, according to a report in ESPNcricinfo, Pant copped a blow to his body. The report also claimed that the Indian team has been training behind a black cloth at the WACA in Perth.

With black cloth placed outside the nets to give more privacy to the Indian team, fans took turns to get a glimpse of the training through several vantage points on Tuesday.

However, those vantage points were covered with cloth, while security was tightened as Kohli and other senior players trained on Wednesday.

India's squad for Border-Gavaskar Series: Rohit Sharma (c), Jasprit Bumrah (vc), Ravichandran Ashwin, Mohammad Shami, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Shubman Gill, Ravindra Jadeja, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel (wk), Sarfaraz Khan, Virat Kohli, Prasidh Krishna, Rishabh Pant (wk), KL Rahul, Harshit Rana, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Mohammed Siraj, Washington Sundar

(With ANI Inputs)