Wriddhiman Saha, R Ashwin, and Prithvi Shaw will represent India in the Adelaide Test. Umesh Yadav will be the third fast bowler. These were the main questions India asked itself two days before the Test: whether to continue backing the flashy Shaw, whether to play a spinner and persist with the safer option of Ashwin, and which of the wicketkeepers should play. On the eve of the day-night Test, they cleared up all the confusion by naming the XI.
Shaw had been under pressure, with Shubman Gill performing better in the two tour matches, impressing cricket legends.
However, Shaw was the opening batsman and proved in a four-inning stint in New Zealand that he can be destructive. He scored 0, 19, 40 and 3 in the two matches of the tour, but more than the scores, it was his loose shots that worried the experts. It is understood, however, that with a settled middle order, India also wanted continuity at the top and stuck with the opener.
As reasonable as it is to play Ashwin, this time, it could have been argued not to play a spinner at all in the first match of the series because in day-night Tests in Australia, spinners have averaged 49 despite Lyon’s superlative average of 25 in these matches. Lyon’s success is perhaps a sign that world-class spinners have the opportunity to correct these statistics based on a small sample of seven Tests. There is no doubt that Ashwin and Lyon have been the two leading spinners in Test cricket, followed only a little by Jadeja, during this decade.
In the case of the wicketkeeper, however, India dropped the regular Pant, who has been preferred to Saha in Tests outside of Asia, where most of the wicketkeeping work is done standing up. It is in India where the team management believes that Saha’s superior wicketkeeping skills come into play when standing up to the spinners. The team management seems to have decided that the pink ball does a lot and will require a more established wicketkeeper.
And despite Pant’s century in the SCG warm-up, he had an ordinary tour of New Zealand, scoring 60 runs in four innings. He has not played for India in any international cricket since then. Yadav was the favorite to be India’s third fast bowler, replacing the injured Ishant Sharma. Not only does he have experience in Tests, this is his fourth tour of Australia, but he also impressed in the only warm-up match he played, taking 3 for 48 and 1 for 14 and also scoring useful runs in the order. India XI: 1 Mayank Agarwal, 2 Prithvi Shaw, 3 Cheteshwar Pujara, 4 Virat Kohli (capt.), 5 Ajinkya Rahane, 6 Hanuma Vihari, 7 Wriddhiman Saha (wk), 8 R Ashwin, 9 Umesh Yadav, 10 Mohammed Shami, 11 Jasprit Bumrah
