Cheteshwar Pujara has been accumulating runs at an extraordinary rate in the County Championship playing for Sussex. Pujara scored an unbeaten 170 off 197 balls in an unusually aggressive innings for Sussex in their ongoing match against Middlesex. The game brought him face to face with Pakistan pace spearhead Shaheen Afridi, who is playing for Middlesex this season.
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This isn’t the first time that Pujara is coming across a Pakistan international this season in the County Championship. He shares a dressing room with Pakistan wicketkeeper Mohammad Rizwan, with whom he had also put up a strong 154-run stand with him during Sussex’s previous match against Durham.
Pujara earlier scored 203 in that game, before which he had scored 109 and an unbeaten 201 in the match before that. He has hence scored a whopping 717 runs at an average of 143.40 in just four matches this County season.
Sussex endured a poor start and lost their opening two wickets within seven deliveries, bringing the veteran India batter to the strike.
Pujara didn’t shy away from taking an aggressive approach against Shaheen even as Sussex were in a spot of bother during the innings. During the third ball of the third over, Shaheen dragged back his length, keeping his line onto Pujara’s body; however, instead of leaving the delivery, Pujara played an adventurous upper-cut and cleared the fence.
Pujara led Sussex to a score of 335/4 while Afridi ended the innings with figures of 1/35 in the 12 overs he bowled. Pujara had scored 16 off 10 balls in the first innings of the match in which Afridi recorded figures of 3/97 in 27.4 overs.
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