Watched a lot of Ashwin tapes but stuck to my strength, says Lyon

Photo: AP

Bengaluru: After returning with the best figures of 8/50 for any visiting bowler in India, Australia off-spinner Nathan Lyon on Saturday said he drew inspiration by watching videos of his Indian counterpart Ravichandran Ashwin, but stuck to his strength of extracting bounce from the track at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium.

Lyon, who scripted India's downfall scalping the remaining five wickets in a span of just 21 runs after the tea session, said he had bowled close to 1200 deliveries in the preparatory camp in Dubai ahead of the subcontinent tour.

"I don't know what to say. I watched a lot of Ashwin tapes, but I stuck to my strength of getting bounce. I bowled about 1200 balls in Dubai," Lyon said at the end of the first day's play.

"We worked hard as a bowling group. We discussed how to bowl in India, the toughest place to tour for us."

"That last hour was big for me, I had my pads on so this is the first time I have smiled. I worked a lot with John Davison in the lead-up to the Big Bash League (BBL) games, used to bowl an hour every day. He can take a lot of credit as well. There were some cracks there, and I was trying to hit some," he added.

Australia finished the opening day at 40/0 with both the openers David Warner (23 not out) and Matt Renshaw (15 not out) intact.