An old-school youngster

Renshaw has stood out with great character

In an Australian line-up where majority of the batsmen have little time for the traditional grind-the-attack Test batting, Matt Renshaw belongs to the old school of batsmanship.

With tight defence and matching patience, he has been crucial in Australia’s dominance of India in the ongoing series. The southpaw followed up his impressive show in Pune with another determined innings (60) to help Australia take first innings lead in the second Test here on Sunday. In doing so, Renshaw has alone faced a whopping 67 overs (402 balls) spread over eight hours that holds testimony to his temperament.

The 20-year-old shared the secret of his ability to bat long after the day’s play. “When I was younger I wasn't the biggest bloke and so instead of retiring on some balls, I retired on some runs,” said Renshaw, who now stands at over six feet. “Once we got to fifty we had to retire and someone else could come in, so I didn't really want to let anyone else bat. I just wanted to bat for myself (and) so I tried to get to fifty as slow as possible. So I don't think it was my fault, I think it was my size,” he revealed.

Fighting fire with a smile     

Renshaw said his aim was to play with a smile on his face and bat for as long as possible. “The plan this morning was just to try and bat as long as possible and wear the Indian bowlers down. They've come off a long summer and played a lot of Tests so we know that if we can get them into a high amount of overs, we'd be in a good position.”

The Queensland batsman admitted that Ashwin beyond a point became too predictable with his angle. “I think so. It gave us a pretty clear plan what he was trying to do and how he was trying to get us out. We worked out that and just tried to combat that as well as possible.”

Having batted for long on both the Pune pitch and here, Renshaw felt the Chinnaswamy surface was more challenging. “I think just the variety of different types of spin. I think some are turning quite a lot and some are not turning as much and some are just going on with the angle.

“I think Pune we knew it was going to spin, this one we don't really know which one is going to spin, so that's probably the hardest challenge,” he reasoned.