Aussie depth not lost on Raj ahead of tour

India skipper Mithali Raj

Indian women's Test and ODI team skipper Mithali Raj wants her teammates to come up with their best performance against the world's best team during the upcoming Australia tour.

The Indians will begin their tour with a three-match ODI series starting in Sydney on September 19. Both teams will lock horns for the first-ever day-night Test at Perth from September 30. Later, they will return to Sydney for a three-match T20I series starting October 7.

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"I want the team to go in with a lot of confidence, not thinking about the grey areas that we have. We know we are playing against the best side in the world and clearly we need to get our ‘A' game into every match we play," Mithali told Sunday mid-day during a pre-departure virtual press conference on Saturday, when asked about the team's areas of concern.

Head coach Ramesh Powar is looking at the Australia tour as preparation for next year's ODI World Cup to be held in New Zealand. "Right now, we are focusing on
the World Cup preparation. We can't just go with a mindset that we have to prepare for that [the one-off Test]. I think it's about confidence. We need to carry our one-day confidence into the Test. I am confident that we won't need to practise separately for the pink-ball Test. At the end of day, it is a game of bat and ball,"
remarked Powar.

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