Cheteshwar Pujara will go into the New Zealand series high on confidence having scored 166 and 256 not out in his last two knocks in the Duleep Trophy. And, while that augurs well for India ahead of a long season, the series against New Zealand will still be an extremely crucial one for Pujara. His Test record after 35 matches looks rather impressive -- 2482 runs at just under 47, with seven hundreds, as many fifties, and a best of 206 not out. But, stats always do not tell the exact story. The fact that is while he excelled in the first half of his career, things have not quite gone according to plan of late.
Pujara made an impressive debut against Australia at Bangalore in 2010. His 72 eased India to victory in a somewhat tricky chase. But, he was soon to learn how tough Test cricket could get. Chosen for the tough tour of South Africa in 2010-2011, he returned with scores of 19, 10 and 2. Following the Proteas horror, he found himself out of the national reckoning for a while owing to injury and poor form. But, he returned in the best way possible. Against New Zealand at Hyderabad in August 2012, he smashed 159. Pujara's past success against the Kiwis should give him further confidence as the India take on the same opponent.
Following the New Zealand series, Pujara continued his good run at home against the Englishmen as well, even as the team struggled overall, and went down in the series. Pujara kicked off the series with a superlative 206 not out at Ahmedabad and went on to make 135 at Mumbai. His failures at Kolkata and Nagpur, where he failed to reach even the half century mark, coincided with India's failure. He roared back to form with a double hundred against Australia at Hyderabad in March 2013, and followed it with up 113 against West Indies in Sachin Tendulkar's farewell Test in November 2013 in Mumbai.
India's string of away tours began with the visit to South Africa in late 2013. Pujara blossomed in the two Tests, with scores of 153 at Johannesburg and 70 at Durban. This was however followed by the horror tour of New Zealand during which he registered scores of 1, 23, 19 and 17. Pujara has not been the same player at the Test level since. After floundering in Kiwi land, things continued to go downhill for Pujara on the subsequent tour of England. His technique as well as temperament let him down, as he managed just one fifty in the four Test matches, played in July-August 2013. Pujara got numerous starts, but did not convert any into a big score.
He had a much more confident start to the tour of Australia in December 2013, making a fluent 73 at Adelaide, but the England problems came back to haunt him, as he did not make another significant score in the series. With his career at the crossroads, Pujara resurrected himself, carrying him bat en route to his 145 not out against Sri Lanka at Colombo in August 2015. Pujara got a lucky break as the regular openers were out injured. He got 77 in the Mohali Test against South Africa in November 2015. But, since it has been the same old story of failure again. Will the Duleep Trophy success resurrect his career? We will know soon.
--By A Cricket Analyst
