VIDEO | Frustrated" Nathan Lyon goes around Cheteshwar Pujara to ask if he is "bored

While many thought, for the Indian cricket team intent was nothing but expressing themselves from ball one, and get the better of the opposition, they, of course, didn’t see the other side of the coin before Cheteshwar Pujara decided to unleash it. The desperation to grind it out despite looking innocuous made him a special character in the team, and well, the best player in the entire series. He made run-scoring ugly but forced the Aussies to surrender to his immense mental toughness.

Of many duels that he has had with the Aussie bowlers, his one-on-one battle with Nathan Lyon has been the most celebrated one this series. The Australian offspinner’s plan of targeting the rough areas and imparting over-spin to it was negated by the Indian No.3’s astute footwork and brilliant use of the pad. Sydney was one such day where he negated almost everyone and didn’t give the hosts a single chance to dismiss him. That made the Aussie look at the sky in despair and asked the lady luck to help them.

On his way to his century today, Pujara went past Sunil Gavaskar (1033) for the balls faced in a single series in Australia and seems poised to overcome Rahul Dravid’s score as well. Seeing that, Lyon went near Pujara to ask "Aren't you bored yet?". The soft-spoken Saurashtra boy just gave a smile and kept doing what he does the best - grinding and scoring runs to take India to a total of 303/4 at stumps.