South Africa have not won a Test match in India for 15 years, but there’s a “real hunger and desire” to end this drought in the upcoming series, according to spinner Keshav Maharaj, who described it as
one of their toughest tours.
India and South Africa will face off in a two-match Test series starting November 14, with Kolkata and Guwahati hosting the games.
Acknowledging the challenge ahead, Maharaj said in an online interaction, “There’s a real hunger and desire within the camp to beat India in India. It’s probably one of the toughest tours, if not the toughest in the Proteas calendar, for the various generations that have come (here).
“We feel like it’s one of our biggest tests. And it will be a wonderful opportunity to grade ourselves, to see how far we’ve come slowly.
“We have started to conquer other parts of the subcontinent. And I feel like this is one assignment that we really, really want to take.”
Despite being one of the most consistent sides in Test cricket in recent years, South Africa failed to win in their last two series in India, in 2015 and 2019.
Spin To Win In IND vs SA
Maharaj also believes that the curators in India are unlikely to prepare spin-friendly pitches for this series, unlike in Pakistan recently, where spinners dominated to help South Africa level the series after losing the first game.
“I don’t think it will be as spin-friendly as we experienced in Pakistan. I think it will be good wickets that will deteriorate as the game goes on. So, probably, more of your traditional Test wickets from what we see,” said left-arm spinner.
“I think if you watched a bit of the West Indies series, it was good wickets that went almost to day four and five. So, I do believe that the sort of narrative is changing in terms of getting wickets.
“They (India) are a wonderful team and they’ve come a long way, especially with the transition that they have had. I would think that they want to go with good cricket wickets, just judging from the West Indies series.”
In their previous two tours to India, the Proteas saw the likes of R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja dominate on turning tracks.
Maharaj also mentioned that they will carry some momentum from the Pakistan series into the matches against India.
“We are carrying a bit of momentum from Pakistan in that second Test, (where) we showed that regardless of the toss, we’re still going to fight and try to force the result in our way.
“I think there’s a real precision about how we’ve gone about our business throughout this cycle so far, and in the previous cycle,” said Maharaj.
(With inputs from Agencies)
