Virat Kohli on his team: We have more experience

For a team that have conquered Australia twice on successive tours in 201819 and 202021 Indiarsquos next biggest challenge is to triumph in England Since 2014 England have lost only two Test series at homemdashto Sri Lanka 01 and recently to New Zealand before the World Test Championship WTC final Though both were twoTest series the contest against India will comprise five Tests starting in Trent Bridge Nottingham todayTeam India were crushed 14 during their last series on English soil in 2018 but the scoreline does not reflect how closelyfought that battle was lsquoUsed to the weatherrsquoSkipper Virat Kohli believes his team are better equipped this time than in 2018 thanks to the time June 18 to 23 they got after the WTC final concluded in Southampton ldquoWersquove been here for two months You get used to that weather which changes so quickly Your body also gets acclimatised to those changes Those small changes matter and mentally you get more comfortable so thatrsquos a factor that may be a little advantageousBetter self beliefldquoSecondly compared to the last tour we have more experience Our younger players are back here for a second time Those things we couldnrsquot execute last time as a team Irsquom confident this time even if some fail which will happen we will have someone in every situation who can handle it Someone or the other will say lsquoI can lift the team from this situationrsquo So this belief has grown significantly since the last tourrdquo Kohli told reporters during a virtual press conference on the eve of todayrsquos TestThe fickle English weather and tricky conditions can make scoring hard for batsmen Kohli though showed the way with his masterclass batting display during the last tour where he scored 593 runs at an average of 5930mdasha far cry from his 134 runs at 1340 in five Tests during the English summer of 2014Kohli said it is important to embrace the difficult situations ldquoYou can have all the experience in the world but it boils down to execution in crunch moments That comes only from belief and how badly you want to be in situations which are not easy As long as you are trying to embrace that you will find answers to all the questions that are thrown at usrdquo the Indian skipper saidldquoI have loved every moment of it Otherwise in my opinion you cannot play at this level for a long timemdashif you donrsquot want to be in situations that are totally opposite to what your comfort zone isrdquo he addedKohli refused to add that lsquoextra specialrsquo element if India win the Test series in England this time ldquoFor us it is all about playing difficult tough cricket and wanting to win in conditions that are not ours That is the only challenge I seerdquo he saidlsquoCriticism doesnrsquot affect PujararsquoIndia skipper Virat Kohli seemed unfazed dealing with a selectorial headache to decide Rohit Sharmarsquos opening partner after Mayank Agarwal was ruled out of the first Test due to a concussion He also backed Cheteshwar Pujara who faced criticism for his slow batting during the WTC finalldquoI honestly feel that a player of his calibre should be left alone and the responsibility is with the individual to figure the drawbacks in his game that he needs to work on I can from the outside say that the criticism is unnecessary but I know for a fact that Pujara does not carerdquo he saidAlso Read Tokyo Olympics All eyes on Rani Rampal and Co Lovlina Borgohain