Ahmedabad: Australia all-rounder Cameron Green is seventh time lucky as he has converted a half century into hundred. Cameroon Green now feels more like a Test cricketer with ‘monkey off your back’. Green is playing his 20th Test. He scored 114 off 170 balls and his innings was no less significant than Usman Khawaja’s 180 that took Australia to a solid first innings score of 480 on the second day of the fourth Test against India here Friday.
“You feel more like a Test cricketer when you’ve got that monkey off your back, so it is nice to tick that off in a way. It’s so special,” Green told reporters at the end of the day’s play.
“I think I might have got a bit lucky. I got from 70, to 80, to 90 pretty quickly, so that probably helped a bit. I did not have much time thinking about the hundred,” Green said.
With a top score of 84 in his previous 19 Test outings, this innings was certainly special. “It was really special, obviously (being 95) over the lunch break that 40 minutes felt like an hour and forty. But I was batting with Uzzy (Khawaja’s nickname). The whole time, there was experience at the other end and he was batting beautifully and that helped a lot,” Green said, recollecting the moments just before he reached his ton.
In his two years in Test cricket, Green has understood that it is no bed of roses and hence would like to make hay till the sun shines.
“It’s my 20th Test so I’ve had a good chance to see the ups and downs of Test cricket, see it for what it is. It’s an incredibly tough game, and when you get moments like that you really cherish them. So yeah I’ve seen how tough Test cricket is and I’m enjoying every second of it,” asserted Green.
Green said on a good track like the one at Motera, playing straight is key. It helped him get back his batting rhythm which would have been a bit difficult had his Test comeback happened Down Under.
“Maybe, if you’re playing in Australia where the ball is nipping around and so it is tough in the middle. However, the wicket here was very good to bat on. I had a chance to play with a straight bat and get myself in, which was really nice,” Green informed.
For him, Khawaja’s presence was the best calming influence that he could have had. “With Uzzy, he’s an experienced head who’s played Test cricket for more than 10 years now. He’s so valuable for guys like myself and a few of the young guys in the team the way he goes about it,” Green pointed out.
“I’m trying to learn as much as I can off him, and luckily enough there are a lot of guys in the change rooms like that, you’ve got Travis Head, Smudge (Steve Smith), they’re all the best in the world at the moment, so I’m incredibly lucky I’ve got guys around like that,” he concluded.