Ravindra Jadeja is all set to make his comeback in the Boxing Day Test against Australia, starting December 26 at the Melbourne Cricket Ground after recovering from a concussion suffered during 1st T20I.
All-rounder Ravindra Jadeja missed the last two T20Is besides the opening Day-Night Test at the Adelaide Oval that the visiting team lost by eight wickets as they registered their lowest ever Test score of 36 in 2nd innings.
Ravindra Jadeja Clears Fitness Test And Expected To Stage A Strong Comeback
Ravindra Jadeja’s inclusion is expected to strengthen India’s batting, which looked fragile during the pink-ball Test. The left-handed batsman and spinner cleared the fitness test on Thursday, December 24 and will replace Virat Kohli, the regular Indian captain, who has taken paternity leave to be with his wife Anushka Sharma, who’s due to give birth in the month of January.
Ravindra Jadeja, who played 49 Tests was on process returning to the desired fitness right from the start of the Adelaide Test and sprinted, batted and bowled showing no signs of apparent discomfort.
On Thursday, he impressed two of the physical conditioning coaches and hence was given the green signal to feature in 2nd Test. In the training session, he batted for sometime after which he rolled his arms over for quite a while. The left-hander looked at his best, sprinting up and down the pitch with no palpable signs of discomfort. He was highly delighted after the short, yet rigorous training session.
Mohammed Siraj And Shubman Gill May Debut In Boxing Day Test
The second Test is set to witness a debutant between Mohammed Siraj and Navdeep Saini with the Hyderabad fast bowler likely to get the nod. Either of the duos will debut replacing Mohammed Shami, who has returned home after fracturing his arm during the first Test. According to Cricbuzz, dashing wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant is set to don the wicketkeeper’s gloves in place of technically correct gloveman Wriddhiman Saha.
In the Day-Night warm-up game at the Sydney Cricket Ground, Rishabh Pant scored an unbeaten rapid-fire ton and looked comfortable and at sheer ease. Back in the 2018-19 Border Gavaskar Trophy when India had won maiden Test series Down Under, Rishabh Pant was also the second-highest run-scorer, showing his credentials to play in Australian conditions. He amassed 350 runs in 4 Tests averaging 58.33 and finished after Cheteshwar Pujara who amassed 521 runs and was leading scorer.
For the second Test, India are also set to hand Shubman Gill his maiden Test cap as another incumbent opener Prithvi Shaw had a torrid time during the opening Test, getting bowled in the first innings by Mitchell Starc and then in 2nd innings by Pat Cummins as the gap between bat and pad exposed his weakness.
Shubman Gill scored a fifty in the second warm-up game and his exclusion raised a lot of eyebrows. From being 0-1 down, India have a tough task ahead of them under the leadership of Ajinkya Rahane.
Shubman Gill and Mohammed Siraj will debut and Ravindra Jadeja and Rishabh Pant had made a return in the team. Hanuma Vihari has retained his place which means KL Rahul will have to wait to be back in Test reckoning.
Here’s the playing XI for Team India:
ALERT?: #TeamIndia for 2nd Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against Australia to be played in MCG from tomorrow announced. #AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/4g1q3DJmm7
— BCCI (@BCCI) December 25, 2020