New Delhi: Little Master, Sunil Gavaskar, feels that it’s the time that young Indian team is all set to face the tough teams outside the home conditions and this victory of 4-0 against Australia will be the stepping stone for the success that will come in future.
"Indian cricket has hardly seen a 4-0 victory and this series win is surely special in every respect. It was more of a team effort rather than individual performances and we should appreciate their hard work," Gavaskar told NDTV.
"Indian youth brigade has been the real star of this series and this is what makes it special. Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja getting 29 and 24 wickets in the series respectively is itself speaks volume for their exceptionally consistent performance. New guys like Murli Vijay and Chetashwar Pujara are scoring more than 400 runs and Indian captain led from the front in the first Test of the series and his glove-work has been at its very best in this series," said Gavaskar.
"Indian team is growing from strength to strength and that is what needed when the side is going through either a tough phase or from transition. But we need to wait and watch that how well they will do on the foreign soils which will be of much more value and performing on those wickets will separate the great players from good players."
"Any Team is strong in their home conditions. So, it would be a tough call to take who is the better side among India and Australia. India lost 2-1 to England because England had some very good spin bowlers to exploit Indian conditions. However, Australia fell short in that department and Nathan Lyon was the lone warrior for them,” said Gavaskar, adding that India should start focusing on South-Africa tour.
“It’s going to be the toughest tour for them and conditions will be completely different. They don’t have any Test series to play before this series," he said.
Talking about Ajinkya Rahane, who had an unforgettable debut, Gavaskar said, "It’s not a right thing to judge a debutant Ajinkya Rahane just on the performance of one match. He deserves some more chances and then some conclusions should be drawn. You need to have some patience with youngsters as they are new to the International arena. Maybe, he will do well in away series because sometimes youngsters do well overseas when expectations are not high. Team management need to show faith and be patient with him.".