Last Updated on 2 weeks by Charbel Coorey

Pat Cummins is raring to go for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT), with the added motivation of reaching the 2025 World Test Championship (WTC) Final. Australia are favourites to reach the final at Lord’s to defend the crown they won against India at The Oval in 2023.

With two Tests in Sri Lanka to come in January, one feels the five-match BGT series will be crucial to Australia’s hopes. The Aussies have lost four of their past five Tests in the Island nation, including a 1-1 draw in 2022.

WTC is something we talk about a lot – Pat Cummins

In an interview with Hindustan Times, Cummins said the WTC adds even more motivation to the drive Australia already have to break their BGT drought against India. He said the tournament adds another layer to an already fascinating series.

“The WTC does provide an added motivation,” the Australian captain said. “We won it the last time around so we’re desperate to go out and defend that title.”

“That is kind of the other layer to this series. Obviously, you’re trying to win every single Test match, but there’s also more on the line with the World Test Championship points up for grabs. It’s something we talk about a lot; we’ve got this series against India and then Sri Lanka afterwards which are our last two series in this cycle.”

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We have plans for certain India players – Cummins

Cummins also said the key is keeping the Indian batters as quiet as possible. Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma are looking to rediscover their best form.

“Every player goes through a kind of good form, bad form,” said Cummins when asked about the form of Rohit and Virat. “If you’re going to have a long Test career, you’re going to have those little patches. Our job is obviously to try and keep the Indian batters as quiet as we can so we’ll wait and see. Those two [Rohit and Virat] are obviously some of India’s more experienced players, so we’ll see what happens.”

Cummins also touched on the importance of sound plans against some of the players, most notably Rishabh Pant who has caused Australia trouble over the years.

“He [Pant] is someone who always moves the game on pretty quickly, so for some of the players, you have to have some sound plans, too,” Cummins said. “He’s played well, he had a good series out here in Australia. So yeah, we know he can be dangerous when he gets going, so [we’ll] try and have some good plans and hope they come off.”

The first Test at Perth is set to be played on a fast, bouncy surface. Australia have won all four previous Tests at Optus Stadium, but will need to be on their game given their own batting concerns across formats over the past year.