David Warner says IPL helped raise his game to another level: ‘Luxury you have here… love, love, love it!’
David Warner says IPL helped raise his game to another level: ‘Luxury you have here… love, love, love it!’
David Warner has rapidly become a fan favourite in Indian stadiums and on social media with his clips imitating famous scenes from movies and showing off dance steps. But the Australian cricketer has also fallen in love with what he calls the “organised chaos” of India, so much so that he was looking to buy a house in India.
In a recent chat with Ravichandran Ashwin for the Indian spinner’s YouTube channel, Warner spoke of why he loves the IPL and how it helped him raise his own level.
“One thing I noticed was that when you were here (in IPL), you had so many net bowlers. In Australia, we basically only face our bowlers. Now, we’ve start getting net bowlers coming in. But on weekends, those guys have to play grade cricket. So we don’t have the luxury of having people (net bowlers) in Australia all the time: Friday, Saturday, Sunday, we probably have no net bowlers,” revealed Warner before adding, “But when I was in IPL, I was like, whoa, who do you want? Do you want left-arm spin? Right-arm leg spin? Off spin? Fast bowler? You had so many options. You got so many bowlers. So that was important because you could bat for a long period of time,” Warner told Ashwin in a recent interview.
“The number one thing that I love, love, love, love when I’m here in India is that you could practice on the center square. Because then you get a great scope of dimensions (of the stadiums). When I was in Hyderabad, that’s all I did was I’d bat in the net, go out there and just face spin the whole time. Fast bowling, we’re used to it. But spin was hitting pockets of the ground, trying to get the dimensions right, playing different shots. And I would have had probably six, seven, all different kinds of spin bowling,” revealed Warner before adding, “I loved it. Absolutely loved it. And that’s where I think my game went to another level, through the middle phase of T20 cricket. And then I batted number four as well because we had to mix and match with the way that our team was built. So I even went to four. And that was why I practiced a lot of spin bowling during that time. But that’s the luxury that you have here. Look, I think you spoke about how you had to shift between number four and open the batting and find the pockets in Hyderabad,” Warner said.
IPL role in helping Australia won Cricket World Cup
Warner also spoke about how the IPL helped Australian team win the World Cup in India last year.
David Warner interview with R Ashwin
“India is definitely a second home. I recall us speaking about it before the World Cup final that the venue had only been played a couple of times by both teams. So you’re almost playing on an even playing field, minus the 100,000 sea of blue in the stands. I think when you’ve played for a long time and you’ve got a big group of players who’ve played for a long time, you sort of negate all that. You don’t really have that sense of the crowd being there. It’s like when we play against India and Australia. There’s hardly any Australians in the crowd. It’s all Indians. So we’re used to it when we play against you,” said Warner before adding, “I think we just embrace the fact that we don’t have anything to lose. We are fortunate that since 2009, I’ve understood the wickets. I’ve understood the venues. But Ahmedabad was the one where the boundaries were similar to Australia. They’re bigger. Our game plan was structured around the MCG. Hit the pockets, run the twos. If we’re bowling, bowl into the chest and target the big boundaries. So for us, it was like Australian game plan inside India. And that’s how we sort of thought about and that’s how we tried to attack that situation.
“It definitely helps being part of the IPL, practicing on the wickets. Practicing the wickets over here, whether it’s test, it’s white ball cricket. You understand the ground. You understand the pitches. You know different red soil, brown soil. Is it going to turn first innings? Where is it going to turn second innings? You sort of get that great understanding. And we’ve got a lot of experience in that team. And I think it wasn’t just by chance that we played the way that we did. It was more the understanding that we had of reading the wickets,” Warner added.
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