Murali Vijay mulls over county stint

Chennai: India Test opener M. Vijay revealed that a lot of county cubs have shown interest in roping him in for a stint ahead of India's tour of England. Cheteshwar Pujara, who went unsold in the IPL-11 auctions, has already announced that he would be warming up for the much-anticipated series with a stint at Yorkshire.

Vijay didn't have a bidder on day one of the auctions, but he was snapped up by Chennai Super Kings towards the end of day two. “After seeing the first day's auction, a lot of teams approached me,” said Vijay.

England tour begins on July 3, but the all-important five-match Test series starts only on August 1. BCCI has already expressed its desired to send its Test specialists a little early to get acclimatised to the conditions. Vijay said a county stint would definitely help. “We are all looking forward to that and hopefully opportunities open up for us to play a few matches before the Test series. There is a procedure for it (to sign up for county). You have to wait. If they need outstation players, then you can get an opportunity to play. There is a lot of procedure involved in that and it's not that easy,” he added.

The TN cricketer said it would have been interesting had the South Africa tour been a five-Test series. “We did a great job even though we ended up on the wrong side. Effort level from our bowlers was fantastic. The batsmen let the team down initially, but we could comeback in third Test,” he said.

Vijay, who had missed the previous edition of the IPL owing to an injury, said he was raring to go this time. “I'm blessed to have had this time off to get myself fitter and I'm really looking forward to his IPL. Hopefully as a team, we can play the brand of cricket that we decide to play and accomplish that,” he said.

“The one good thing about playing for CSK is that we always put the team ahead of individual performances. It is very difficult in franchise-based cricket, because outstation players and domestic players need to have the right rapport to help the team play at a competitive level. We did it with ease in the past,” he added.