The BCCI revealed the highly-anticipated India's squad for the upcoming first Test cricket match against Bangladesh on Sunday. The star cricketers Virat Kohli and Rishabh Pant returned to red-ball cricket but eight players from the last squad failed to make the team.
Both Kohli and Pant are expected to be part of India's playing eleven for the first match starting in Chennai on September 19. However, the duo's return to the team is likely to force the Rohit Sharma-led management some headache to select the playing eleven.
Rohit and Yashasvi Jaiswal will open the innings for India while Shubman Gill faces no competition for the crucial No.3 role. Virat will take his regular No.4 position but fans will be interested to see who will fill the following two places in the playing eleven.
Sarfaraz Khan, Devdutt Padikkal and Dhruv Jurel were impressive in the middle order against England but only Sarfaraz is likely to challenge for the spot with the return of Test regulars.
KL Rahul and Sarfaraz Khan will directly battle for the No.5 role and the former raised his claim after an impressive performance in the Duleep Trophy first-round match. Sarfaraz did nothing wrong on his debut with three fifties in six innings against England but Rahul performed comparatively better than Mumbai batter in Duleep Trophy opener.
Rishabh impressed with a bat by smashing a 34-ball fifty in the second innings against India A while Jurel failed to reach a double-digit score across two innings in the Duleep Trophy. However, Jurel was excellent with wicketkeeping skills and will play as a backup option to Rishabh.
However, there are no major changes to India's bowling unit apart from the inclusion of uncapped Yash Dayal in the place of Mukesh Kumar. Akash Deep also retained his place but is unlikely to make the playing eleven as India will look to field a spin-heavy attack.
Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj are expected to form the pace attack. Axar Patel's impact with both bat and a ball in the recent Duleep Trophy match makes his favourite ahead of Kuldeep Yadav to partner the veteran spin duo of Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja in the playing eleven.
India squad for the first Test against Bangladesh:
Rohit Sharma (C), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, Sarfaraz Khan, Rishabh Pant (WK), Dhruv Jurel (WK), Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Siraj, Akash Deep, Jasprit Bumrah, Yash Dayal.
India's predicted playing XI:
Rohit Sharma (C), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, Rishabh Pant (WK), Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Ravichandran Ashwin, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj.
