London: India coach Rahul Dravid is wary of the threat that David Warner possesses and knows his side must strike early if they are to quell the explosive Australia opener in the ICC World Test Championship final.
Warner has been a mainstay of Australia's top-order for more than a decade now, but the left-hander has been down on his usual output against the red ball in recent times and had his struggles in England during his most recent visit.
It was veteran quick Stuart Broad that was Warner's nemesis during Australia's tour of England in 2019, with the veteran quick using the tactic of bowling around the wicket with great success to restrict the opener to just 95 runs for the series from 10 innings.
While Dravid is hoping he will be able to keep Warner quiet during the one-off World Test Championship Final, he knows the Australia veteran will be well-equipped to nullify those tactics should India go down that path.
"He (Warner) is a class player and it's not as simple as just turning up and bowling around the wicket and getting him out," Dravid said at The Oval on Monday.
"He wouldn't have played 100 Test matches if it was that simple. He's a very good player. He's going to still be able to execute from over and around the wicket."
Dravid said Warner will have done plenty of work on how best to score against India's strong bowling attack and there were few secrets between the two teams these days given the amount of recent matches they have played.
"We will have looked at videos and seen what other teams have done and the lines they've bowled to him...everyone does that sort of thing," Dravid said.
"There's not very much that's there to hide anymore because of data and video analysis.
"Everyone knows what you're looking at and everyone has honestly very similar information about each other."
One player who will be looking to impress Dravid and score plenty of runs in south London this week is experienced India right-hander Ajinkya Rahane.
If selected, the clash against Australia will be Rahane's first Test appearance for India in almost 18 months and Dravid is confident the recently-turned 35-year-old can perform well.
"It is great for us to have someone of his (Rahane's) quality back," Dravid noted.
"He brings a lot of that experience, he brings proven performance in overseas conditions and even in England he's played some terrific innings for us.
"He brings terrific catching in the slips as well to the group and he just brings his personality to the group as well which is really important.
"He's led the team to considerable success. So yeah, it's just great to have someone like him around here." (UNI)
