After a week’s pause, India and England are back in action once again as they face each other in the tiebreaker that is the 3rd Test of their five-match series, in Rajkot today.
England have already shown that they can pose India the kind of challenge that no team has even come close to on Indian soil in the recent past and with the series currently standing at 1-1, the result of this game will prove to be pivotal in the result of the series.
The coin went up for the third time in the series. India won the toss and chose to bat first.
FOLLOW LIVE HERE: IND vs ENG, 3rd Test Day 1 Live Score
In the absence of the experienced Virat Kohli, the young duo of Shubman Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal will once again be expected to lead from the front with the bat as well.
Sarfaraz Khan and Dhruv Jurel have been handed their Test caps. So, that was confirmation enough that both youngsters would be playing.
Ben Stokes will also be looking to spoil the Indians’ party though, as the England skipper plays his 100th Test match of his career.
Captain’s Comments
Rohit Sharma (India): We’re going to bat first. We’ve made some changes, made four changes. Some injuries and some guys coming back from the last game. Two debutants. Siraj and Jadeja are back. Axar Patel and Mukesh Kumar miss out. Looks a good pitch, better than the last two we’ve played on. Rajkot is known to be a good pitch but it’ll deteriorate as it goes. The guys have stood up and done the job for the team when it was needed. The next three Test matches will be as exciting as the first two. Need to keep our focus here and see how we can do well.
Ben Stokes (England): We would’ve batted first too. Time flies when you’re having fun. Fair reflection of both teams, we’ve been very happy with the way we’ve gone about things in the first two Tests. We had a nice break, gave everyone a chance to relax. There was no cricket, we got the families out, it was great. Being here for so long is both physically and mentally demanding. Was a nice opportunity to put the feet up and get some time away from cricket. In Test matches there are only so many moments that you sieze the game in and that’s what India did in the last one.
Playing XIs
India:
Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rohit Sharma(c), Shubman Gill, Rajat Patidar, Sarfaraz Khan, Ravindra Jadeja, Dhruv Jurel(w), Ravichandran Ashwin, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj
England:
Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, Ben Stokes(c), Ben Foakes(w), Rehan Ahmed, Tom Hartley, Mark Wood, James Anderson
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