Team India's home season is all set to commence with the two-match Test series against Bangladesh on September 19. Ahead of the series, India's domestic season also got underway with the Duleep Trophy that saw many senior team players including Shreyas Iyer featuring in the first round. Iyer is named the captain of India D who lost the opening game to India C. He couldn't make a comeback to the Test team despite scoring a quick fifty in the second innings of the first round and is plying his trade in the second round against India A.
India D bundled out India A for 290 runs in the first innings early on the second day and after an early fall of wicket, Iyer came out to bat at three wearing sunglasses. His poor run with the bat in red-ball cricket continued as he bagged a seven-ball duck with Khaleel Ahmed dismissing him. It was a pretty soft dismissal as the India D skipper chipped a full-length delivery to mid-off where Aaqib Khan took a simple catch.
Not long ago, Shreyas Iyer was part of the Indian team and also featured in the first two Tests of the five-match series against England earlier this year. All the drama related to not playing domestic cricket followed then as Iyer also lost his central contact for not featuring in the Ranji Trophy for Mumbai ahead of the Indian Premier League (IPL).
Moreover, he was dropped from the Indian team for a string of low scores in the format and his recent form is not helping his case either. His scores so far in the Duleep Trophy read - 0, 54 and 9 which is not great when players like Musheer Khan and Ishan Kishan have notched up centuries. There is massive competition for places in the middle-order in the Indian team and currently, KL Rahul and Sarfaraz Khan have been picked in the squad for the first Test against Bangladesh.
Rajat Patidar was selected during the England series while Devdutt Padikkal has impressed with back-to-back fifties for India D batting at number four and is slowly making his case stronger as well. Musheer is set to get picked for India A tour of Australia and hence, one feels, time is certainly running out for Shreyas Iyer. He is fast going down the pecking order with players around him performing much better and he has to break down the door with big scores quickly to harbour any chance of making a comeback to India's Test team.
