India’s confidence ‘damaged’ but Australia won’t underestimate visitors: Marnus Labuschagne

Marnus Labuschagne. File
| Photo Credit: PTI

A shattering defeat to New Zealand on home soil would have caused a “little bit of damage” to India’s confidence, but Australia will not make the mistake of underestimating the visitors, said charismatic batter Marnus Labuschagne in Perth on Tuesday (November 19, 2024).

The world No. 2 India are heading into the five-Test Border-Gavaskar series, starting in Perth on Friday (November 22, 2024), following their whitewash at home, which ended their 12-year unbeaten run in their own backyard.

Australia’s middle-order mainstay Labuschagne believes the loss to the Kiwis would have dented India’s confidence.

“It’s really hard to judge. They played in completely different conditions—spindling conditions—but having India come here off the back of a loss at home is something that’s never happened before (in my career),” Labuschagne told the media.

“I think that is a good thing in terms of… they are probably a little bit lower on confidence, not coming off a Test victory, losing to New Zealand 3-0. I think that’s going to do a little bit of damage to their confidence,” he added.

However, Labuschagne insisted that Australia, who have lost each of their last four series to India both home and away, will have to guard against complacency.

“They’re a quality lineup, and they’re one of the best teams in the world. So you can never underestimate a team like that,” he said.

India staged an incredible comeback on their last Australia tour in 2020-21 to win 2-1, despite the absence of regular skipper Virat Kohli and injuries to several other frontline players along the way.

“That’s what happened in 2021 — the likes of (T) Natarajan played, (Mohammad) Siraj got his first crack in Australia, Washington Sundar played,” Labuschagne recalled.

“They had all these guys that were probably a little bit new—Shubman (Gill) played those couple of games (in the 2020-21 series) – so there were new faces around,” he added.

With India set to take the field without regular captain Rohit Sharma and No. 3 batter Gill in the first Test at the Optus Stadium in Perth, Labuschagne said India have enough talent in their ranks to meet all challenges.

“They’re a quality line-up, and they’ve shown that over a period of time. You can’t ever underestimate the depth of Indian cricket,” he said.

“Anyone that gets the opportunity to play for India has had to do a lot of hard work and find their way into that side… to actually play for a team like that, you have to be a very good player,” Labuschagne added.