IND vs AUS 3rd Test: Out of form KL Rahul dropped, Shubman Gill replaces former vice captain

Team India won the toss and elected to bat first against Australia in the third Test match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, here on Wednesday.

"Two changes, Shubman Gill and Umesh Yadav replace KL Rahul and Mohammed Shami," India captain Rohit Sharma said after the toss.

Rahul, who was removed from his role as vice captain for the first two Tests, scored just 38 runs in the series. The opener registered scores of 22, 23, 10, 2, 20, 17 and 1 in his last seven innings.

Rahul's last half century in Test match cricket came in January 2022 against South Africa in Johannesburg. In December 202, he scored his last Test century against the same opponents.

Rahul's place in the side came under a lot of scrutiny following his poor run with the bat. On social media, debates over his place in the team erupted, with former cricketers Venkatesh Prasad and Aakash Chopra exchanging opposing viewpoints backed up by statistics.

Shubman, on the other hand, has been in rich vein of form across formats, scoring 736 runs in 13 Tests with one ton and four half-centuries. He y scored a double ton in ODIs too. He is one of the few Indian players to have a ton in all formats.

Squad:
India Playing XI; Shubman Gill, Rohit Sharma (C), Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Ravindra Jadeja, Srikar Bharat, Ravichandran Ashwin, Axar Patel, Umesh Yadav, Mohammed Siraj

Australia Playing XI; Usman Khawaja, Travis Head, Marnus Labuschagne, Steve Smith (C), Peter Handscomb, Cameron Green, Alex Carey, Mitchell Starc, Nathan Lyon, Todd Murphy, Matthew Kuhnemann

Published on: Wednesday, March 01, 2023, 09:44 AM IST