Pune: The two senior BCCI curators, Ashish Bhowmick, chief curator, BCCI, and Taposh Chatterjee, member of BCCI’s elite curators’ panel, along with the local MCA curator, Jyotiram Phalke, had been standing next to the centre square at the Maharashtra Cricket Association Stadium, Gahunje, for quite a while during New Zealand team’s practice session. The pitch for the second Test lay covered with a sheet of thick, brown cloth.

At exactly 1 pm, as if on cue, the instructions were issued to lift the cover. The heavy kit bags of the Indian team had started to be pulled into the ground for their scheduled practice in the afternoon session.

Four groundsmen got down on their haunches to manually work on the pitch, scruffing it and advancing from end to end. India coach Gautam Gambhir soon joined the curators for a discussion. Captain Rohit Sharma followed later for a close look at the surface, at that point the mowing was being done to trim the grass.

The process was done in full view of the team as if to provide them reassurance after the debacle at Bengaluru where wet weather didn’t permit the ground experts to dish out a pitch to suit the home team’s spin strength. India lost the match in the first session itself, after being blown away for 46 by the NZ pace bowlers.

Down 1-0, India can’t afford to play on another surface which will provide bounce and movement to the pacers. There is some challenge here too for the curators to prepare a slow surface because rains are still around in Pune -- it was drizzling on Monday evening -- but the home team will be happy with the look of the pitch on Tuesday afternoon, devoid of grass, and the work done by the BCCI’s pitch experts. With the sun beating down hard, the wicket was left open at the good length areas on both ends. After all, if they get a dry, turning pitch, it is where India’s spinners are at their best.

Generally, the Kiwis remain unfazed by such happenings, but on this occassion looking at the work being done on the pitch, couple of members of the touring squad also walked to the centre square for a close look at the surface.

Towards the end of the training session, both the India captain and coach again walked to the centre square for another inspection of the pitch. Rohit had owned up in Bengaluru about misreading the surface. Here the thinktank wants to be spot on, said India’s fielding coach Ryan ten Doeschate.

“I haven’t been out there myself yet, but rest assured we’re going to do everything in our capability to give the best assessment of that wicket. We got it slightly wrong in Bangalore the other day. The conditions just caught us on the back foot a little bit. So, you can be sure that the preparation and the assessment of the wicket is going to be as close to perfect as we can make it,” said ten Doeschate.

India’s main concern coming into the second Test was the injury cloud over couple of key players – Shubman Gill and Rishabh Pant. The assistant coach, though, was a harbinger of good news that both are expected to be fit.

“He’s (Gill) batted last week in Bangalore, he had a few nets,” said ten Doeschate. “He’s got a little bit of discomfort, but I’ll think he will be good to go for the Test,” he added.

Both Gill and Pant had a long net session with Pant playing in his usual belligerent fashion. “Rishabh’s pretty good. I think Rohit (Sharma) touched on it the other day. He was having a little bit of discomfort at the end range of his movement with the knee. But fingers crossed he’ll be good to keep in this Test as well,” said ten Doeschate.

Pant had hurt his knee on the second day of the first Test when he was attempting to stump Devon Conway in the 37th over of NZ’s innings. He took a blow and went off the field straightaway. Dhruv Jurel kept for the rest of the first innings and the 27.4 overs of NZ’s second innings.

It means the team management will have a difficult time deciding who to pick in the batting unit. The competition for the sixth batting spot is between KL Rahul and Sarfaraz Khan. The Mumbai batter played a superb knock of 150 in the second innings to save India the blushes of a one-sided defeat.

Sarfaraz skipped Tuesday’s practice session to be with his new-born in Mumbai. He will join the team for Wednesday morning’s practice. All eyes were on Rahul who had a long batting session. In preparation for the tall NZ pacers he even asked bowling coach, Morne Morkel, who is 6 foot 4 inch plus to bowl at him.

“Yeah, there’s no point in sugarcoating it. There’s a fight for a spot (between KL and Sarfaraz),” said ten Doeschate, while allaying concerns over Rahul’s form. “Sarfaraz was obviously brilliant in the last Test. I went to KL after the last Test and said: “how many balls did you play and miss at?” He didn’t play and miss at one ball and that’s what tends to happen when you’re not getting runs. He got the two balls in the game; one caught down the leg side and one that he managed to nick. So, there’s certainly no concerns about KL. He’s batting nicely, he’s in a good mental space, but yeah, we’re certainly going to have to fit seven pieces into six spots for this Test and look at the pitch now and decide what’s going to be best for the team.”

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