With Steve Smith and David Warner back in the Australian team, Indian opener Rohit Sharma has said that the tour to Down Under, scheduled for later this year, would be tougher than last time for the Virat Kohli-led team.

The last time, when India toured Australia in 2018-19, Kohli’s men had given their country first-ever Test-series victory there. But that was an Australian team without David Warner and Steve Smith and Rohit, thus, believed it would not be the same for India in 2020.

“I was looking forward to the New Zealand series but unfortunately, injury (calf muscle) happened at the wrong time,” Rohit told ‘India Today’ on Wednesday as quoted by IANS.

“I can’t wait to go to Australia and play the Test matches there. Australia in Australia with those two guys will be a different ball game,” he added.

Earlier, Australia skipper Tim Paine had also said similar things and issued a warning to India for the Test series, which is still six months away.

“No doubt that we’re a better team than we were last time. You put in 14- or 15-thousand Test runs with Steve Smith and David Warner, and Marnus Labuschange has come on in leaps and bounds and is now in the top three or four batsmen in the world himself. You put that amount of runs in a cricket side that last time we didn’t have (is helpful),” Paine was quoted as per saying on Cricket Australia’s official digital platform.

We’ve got three of the best batsmen in the world in our top six, we’ve got Matthew Wade firing and he adds some real toughness, Travis (Head) has improved a lot since he played here last time,” he added.

Meanwhile, Rohit also spoke about his experience of opening in Test cricket and said that he had been ready for the job since the 2018 Australia tour when the team management gave him enough hints.

“I was told you might be opening in Tests as well. It was two years ago. I was preparing myself from then onwards. You wanted an opportunity, everybody wants to be out there in the middle. I wanted to play and not watch the game,” Rohit said.

“When the chance came along, I was ready. There were some technical aspects I needed to be aware of.

“As a team, we are playing best cricket right now, everybody wants to take the game back to the opposition. If it happens (amid the COVID-19 pandemic), it will be a great series to be part of,” the 33-year-old added.