India's fast-bowling all-rounder Shardul Thakur has termed the World Test Championship final against Australia, starting on Wednesday at The Oval, "once-in-a-lifetime moment", and he is keen to make it count.
It remains to be seen if Thakur, who has played three of his eight Tests so far in England, makes it to the playing XI since the Rohit Sharma-led team would certainly want to go in with an extended batting line-up.
But on his part, the 31-year-old says he is ready to make it count in the final.
"I feel that ICC event, finals especially, you don't get to play them everywhere each and every year, so it's, for a few players or somebody like me, a once-in-a-lifetime moment," Thakur told the ICC.
He added, "All that I want is to make it count. It's always a special moment when you're representing your country — especially India, when there's a billion people out there who dream of playing for the nation and only the best 15 have been chosen to represent the country," Thakur added.
Thakur's case will be a tough one to ignore, for he struck twin half-centuries — 57 and 60 — and claimed three wickets as India won by 157 runs at The Oval in September 2021 against England.
"It's always good to remember your previous performances on a particular ground, but every game is a fresh start. It's different opponents this time around, but yeah it's always good to take motivation from what you've done in the past on a particular ground," he said.
Thakur said batters should look to maximise the advantage in England when the sun is out, since bowlers tend to get a lot of advantage in overcast conditions.
"I think England is challenging because the weather here is a bit funny. When the sun's out it is good for batting, when it's overcast it's good for bowling, so the toss hardly matters, it's all about the cloud cover.
"Obviously the pitch also plays an important role, but we've seen in the past that whenever there's cloud cover the ball suddenly starts swinging and you can't really predict how much the ball is going to move, so that's one of the biggest challenges that a batter faces," he said.
Thakur added, "When it's not swinging, England (has) also got the best pitches to bat on, so it becomes equally tough for bowlers. Even in the helpful conditions it's sort of important to find the right length to nick a batter off or hit his pads, so this is a country that's challenging."
