Australia’s head coach Justin Langer wants his team to be relentless in their pursuit of victory against India.

Langer’s team turned in one of the great bowling performances on day three of their first Test against India, blasting the tourists out for 36.

They head into the second Test as strong favourites, made more so by the absence of Virat Kohli, who has returned to India to be present for the birth of his child.

Langer, however, called on his team to be absolutely relentless in pursuit of victory.

‘If we’re going to become a great team we have to get better at winning after we win and people didn’t quite understand that, but really good teams keep winning and winning, particularly when they’re playing good cricket,’ he said.

‘So it’s an area we’ve addressed, we’ll have to start well Boxing Day morning and then be consistent, because we know India will fight back as we saw in the first two days of the Test match in Adelaide.’

Langer added that, barring injury or illness, the team would stay unchanged from the one that won in Adelaide.

‘Be a pretty courageous man to change the XI after the last one so at this stage unless something happens over the next few days, but we’ll go in with the same XI,’ he said.

The MCG’s 90 000 capacity usually creates an incredible atmosphere, but that has been scaled back to 30 000 in light of COVID-19 protocols. Langer lamented the situation but was excited nonetheless.

‘Being at the MCG, I come here a lot, but it’s just an amazing stadium, Boxing Day, there’s so much hype about it. The boys love playing here. The Indians, a lot of them have probably dreamed of playing a Boxing Day Test match, and 30,000 is better than none. It’s not the same as 90,000, but I’m sure the 30,000 who come in will certainly provide the atmosphere we love about the Boxing Day Test match.’