Ajaz Patel is optimistic that whatever target New Zealand manage to set for India, the home team will not find it easy to chase.

At stumps on Saturday, New Zealand had an overall lead of 143 with just one wicket in hand. With spinners calling the shots on the Wankhede track, Black Caps’ left-arm spinner Ajaz feels that it’s a “challenging” task for the batters.

“Whatever we score, we’re going to have to try and do our best to restrict India, but it’ll be interesting to see how the wicket continues to play... It’s turning quite sharply, it’s inconsistent in terms of how much it does turn and bounce, but as a spinner, it’s encouraging as well that you’re going to get something out of the surface. For batting, it’s quite challenging,” Ajaz, who claimed 5/103 in India’s first innings, said.

“It is certainly turning from both ends, it’s just the bounce that is a little bit variable, so from a batting perspective that can be a challenge as well,” he added.

Ajaz, however, said the pitch hasn’t been as favourable to the spinners in the morning.

“If we have seen the pattern in terms of the wicket, over the last couple of
days in the morning, it probably doesn’t do as much as the afternoon.

“Whether that’s due to the rolling, or whether that’s due to the heat and the wicket drying up throughout the day, I’m unsure. It’ll be interesting to see how that wicket plays tomorrow (Sunday, Day III) morning... whether it kind of reacts the same way or whether it’s a little bit different.”

New Zealand have already pocketed the three-match series having won the first two Tests. But Ajaz did not agree that the visiting spinners have outshone their Indian counterparts.

“I don’t necessarily believe we’ve out-bowled the Indian spinners, the class of the Indian bowling attack is quite phenomenal.

“For us as a spin bowling group, we’ve grown a lot and we can continue to show that everyone is quite capable, there’s a lot of communication between us and we make sure that we’re all aware of what the plan is at a certain given time,” he said.

The 36-year-old also praised Rishabh Pant for his counterattacking innings of 60 off 59 balls. “Rishabh batted exceptionally... he’s the kind of the player that’s put the pressure back on us.”