Rajkot: He might be a top order Test batsman for India now, but Cheteshwar Pujara still calls-up his father after the end of every day’s play to seek latter’s advice regarding the technicalities of his game.
Pujara is just coming off the back of a successful home series against New Zealand, when he was the highest scorer with 376 runs in the three-Test series.
With the five-Test England series looming large on the horizon, Pujara is all set to play a Test match in front of his home crowd in Rajkot, for the first time.
Pujara’s father Arvind was all praises for his son, who took up the sport at quite a young age.
“He had a craze for cricket right since his childhood. Initially, we started making him play with rubber ball so that he doesn’t get scared,” Arvind Pujara was quoted as saying on BCCI.tv. “Then we realised that he shouldn’t play with rubber ball for a long time because he would then end up playing cross batted shots instead of playing straight.
“I started coaching him with leather ball then and I began to get a feeling that he was cut out for more serious cricket. But, that was completely my observation,” continued Pujara senior. “So, I wanted to take second opinions to avoid notions that I was being partial towards my son. Then Karsan Ghavri saw him play and told me to work on his game.”
Arvind Pujara also confessed that his son hardly ever fails to ring him up after the end of day’s play, and ask for his father’s advice on how to improve his game.
“Right since childhood, Cheteshwar has a habit of calling me after the game in the night before going to sleep,” said Arvind.
“When he calls, we speak about the game, how the pitch was and whether there was swing and bounce in the wicket etc. Suppose I had watched the match on TV, then I would tell him small things like how better he could have played or things he could have avoided while batting. I believe such conversations bring about improvement.”
