‘After my 10-wicket haul, wasn’t sure whether I’d get another opportunity to play here again’: NZ’s Ajaz Patel on return to Wankhede | Cricket News

New Zealand’s Ajaz Patel returns to the Wankhede 3 years after his legendary performance where he took 10 wickets for 119 runs back in 2021 against India. This time around, however, he said that the surface looked drier than the one on which he had pulled off his iconic feat.
“Being back in Mumbai is always quite special and it’s a place I call home as well. Having the opportunity to play out here again is quite special. To be honest, after my 10-wicket haul, I wasn’t sure whether I’d get another opportunity to play out here again throughout my career,” Patel, who became the only the third spinner in Test cricket to take all 10 wickets in an innings, said in press conference on Wednesday.
“To be honest with you my memory is very poor so I don’t exactly remember the surface that well but one thing I do remember was it looked a lot drier to start with,” he said.
New Zealand have already taken an unassailable 2-0 lead in a 3-match series but Patel still remains cautious.
“India still have the wood on us when it comes to playing on turning wickets, and traditionally, the Indian batters have done well in turning surfaces,” Patel
“Obviously, they haven’t had maybe as much success as they would have liked in this series so far but they’re certainly an opposition that are very, very skilled and not the easiest to come up against. Their skill set is very vast and for us as a spin group, especially it’s about being able to control what we can control and making sure that we can apply pressure for long periods of time and making sure that we’re delivering the best balls on a given surface,” he added.

India and New Zealand will lock horns in Wankhede for the 3rd Test which is scheduled to start from November 1 with the Kiwis looking for a 3-0 whitewash.