After three weeks in sweltering UAE heat, where they won a highly-charged T20 Asia Cup, India arrived in Ahmedabad for a Test match that starts on Thursday. It’s a short turnaround even by modern standard scheduling. However, the two-match Test series against the eight-ranked West Indies is exactly the breather India’s head coach Gautam Gambhir would have hoped at the conclusion of what has been a turbulent ride as far as red-ball cricket goes.
They were whitewashed by New Zealand in their Test series at home. Word from the Indian dressing room here is that the series defeat to the Kiwis still hurts them. Post their final triumph against Pakistan on Sunday, when the topic of West Indies Test came up, some of the coaching staff’s memory quickly jogged back to the New Zealand series which in many ways punctured their spirits. It is why when the selectors met to pick the squad for the West Indies series, they didn’t think twice to name a full-strength squad that also includes Jasprit Bumrah.
Around the same time last year, at the conclusion of the Bangladesh Test series at home, it all looked rosy for the new coach. Twelve months later as the home season is on the horizon, a few familiar faces – Virat Kohli, R Ashwin, Rohit Sharma, who made India a fort impossible to breach from 2013 to 2024 – are nowhere in the vicinity. While Kohli and Rohit have missed home Tests during their long career, Ahmedabad will be the first one in which Ashwin’s name would be missing in the team sheet for a home Test since he made his debut in 2011. In 65 Tests in India, Ashwin had 383 wickets to his name at an average of 21.57.
This, though, is no means a fresh start. Having pressed the reset button, moving on from the trio after successive Test series defeats at New Zealand at home and Australia away, the five Tests in England offered plenty of hope. A 2-2 scoreline, under a new Test captain in Shubman Gill, was commendable, giving India a decent start to the World Test Championship. Having won the ICC Champions Trophy and now the Asia Cup in different formats in less than six months, getting the Test team to where it belongs will be top of Gambhir’s wishlist.
The arrival of West Indies offers India the cushion they have badly sought. Having played the first Test at the old Motera Stadium way back in 1983, the now renamed Narendra Modi stadium is totally contrasting just like how the Windies have fallen off the pack in Tests. Toast of the cricketing world back then, Clive Lloyd’s world-beaters arrived in India in the first week of October and returned only on the New Year’s eve, where they humbled then World Champions India 5-0 in ODIs and 3-0 in Tests including the one in Ahmedabad to exact revenge for the ODI world cup loss.
Having played the first Test at the old Motera Stadium way back in 1983, the now renamed Narendra Modi stadium is totally contrasting just like how the Windies have fallen off the pack in Tests. (AP Photo)
More than 40 years later, the West Indies are facing a crisis that has now spilled over to the white-ball set up too, as they lost a T20 series to Nepal the other night. So what sort of challenge Roston Chase & Co would be able to provide India in the two Tests remains a big question even though their coach Darren Sammy has spoken about drawing inspiration from New Zealand which blanked India 3-0.
It is this lost ground that India want to regain and the home season that includes two Tests each against West Indies and South Africa — with a white-ball tour of Australia sandwiched in between — offers the perfect platform. Before the WTC Champions come along in November mid, India have pieces to seamlessly set in. The No 3 position, which was flirted between B Sai Sudharsan and Karun Nair, is now in the hands of the former. Having decided to move on from Karun, the two Tests will present the left-hander ample time and opportunity to find his feet before the Proteas come calling. With Yashasvi Jaiswal and KL Rahul untouchable at the top, Gill providing the might at No 4, having a dependable No 3 who will serve them for long is essential for India regain the lost ground. It is the position that has been problematic since Cheteshwar Pujara days came to an end, with a permanent solution yet to be found.
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The No 3 position, which was flirted between B Sai Sudharsan and Karun Nair, is now in the hands of the former. (AP Photo)
In 2015, a year after their big transition in their batting department, the four-Test series against South Africa marked the beginning of a dominance that looked unbreakable till the Kiwis shocked them last year. Since then, India’s planning has all centred around the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in 2026 which will be the last in the current WTC cycle. It is with the ambition of making the WTC final that Gambhir pressed for changes. It is a team that needs a bit of confidence booster. For a coach who believes in the philosophy of ‘a happy dressing room is a winning dressing room’ the home season couldn’t have come early.
Gill joins the net
The Indian team that arrived in Ahmedabad on Monday night had the first training session on Tuesday afternoon. Apart from the likes of Yashasvi Jaiswal, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Siraj, KL Rahul, B Sai Sudharsan, Dhruv Jurel, Devdutt Padikkal, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Prasidh Krishna and N Jagadeesan only Gill from the team that was in Dubai joined the session that began at 1.30pm and finished around 4.30pm.
The postOperation Test cricket begins: India’s first series at home without Kohli, Rohit, and Ashwin begins against West Indies | Cricket News appeared first on Indian Express
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