India in Australia, 2020-21

[jaydeep]

It seems, Jadeja is out for a longer duration .. He just tweeted, "Out of action for a while, surgery completed. But soon return with a bang'

[prasen9]

Yes, Jadeja is out of the first two England tests. Jadeja out How is our old friend Shabaz Nadeem? If he is still alive, can we dust him up and play him? Or else, who is our best leggie? I like Shreyas Gopal. He would be a like for like replacement (at least a poor man's one) because he can bat. Rahul Chahar is too young?

[rajitghosh]

Is this the tour where highest number of players have got injured? There was the 1976 tour of West Indies where Holding & Co sprayed the Indian batsmen with beamers and bouncers and lot of players had got injured to the extent Bedi had declared the batting with 5 players not batting.
A scorecard of that famous match.
https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/ind ... -scorecard
In this match though only Pant and Jadeja were injured by bodyline bowling. The rest are injuries as a result of too much cricket and fitness regimes that probably don't allow recovery time.

[prasen9]

COVID-19 which meant a lot of folks were not doing their regular fitness regime with quarantines and all that. Plus the mental toll.

[Kumar]

Shardul’s fc average is lower than Washington, but his t20 and odi are better! But smaller sample size!
Considering this is Gabba and if bumrah is playing I would go with Shardul

[Atithee]

Sundar will take Jadeja’s or Ashwin’s place, not competing for Bumrah’s place. He’s competing with Kuldeep for a slot.

[prasen9]

Yes, Sundar is a candidate if we want to play a fifth bowler. That person needs to be able to bat. Among our bowlers, barring Ashwin, he is perhaps the best bat. Hence, he has to be the fifth bowler. Now, we can go with four bowlers and use the space for a specialist keeper or another batsman but then we run the risk of one bowler getting injured or hammered and having no cover. It is a coaching failure that none of our batsmen can bowl. In earlier days, Azharuddin used to bowl as did Tendulkar, Ganguly, primarily in ODIs but also in tests to cover 5-10 overs per innings if needed. Even Rohit and Kohli used to bowl a bit in ODIs. How come none of our current batsmen can bowl a bit?

[suresh]

Looks like our cricketers have to fend for themselves in Brisbane. Perfect setting for losing the match. Imagine finishing a day's play and having to do one's laundry.

'No pool, no room service, no housekeeping' - Indians upset with DIY life at Brisbane hotel

[prasen9]

We have a right to be upset and try to get it fixed. But, both teams have the same facilities. So, if we lose, we should not use this per se. We can say that the lack of a pool made it difficult for Ashwin to recover though. Etc. Just trying to be fair. Most importantly, as a touring team in COVID times, we have lost more than 11 players. That would be the primary reason.

There is a reason to not have people come and service. They want to avoid a full quarantine when the players come back to India. Thus, it is best to reduce the number of people. If you do not want to live like that and want to have a stricter quarantine when you return, so be it.

[PKBasu]

It is absurd that Washington Sundar is about to get a test cap, having taken just 30 first-class wickets -- 11 of which were in a single match; that is the only match in which he ever took a 5-fer. Axar Patel, for instance, at age 26 has had a real first-class career, with 134 wickets at 27.38 apiece -- and has reason to be aggrieved at not having received a test cap yet. Axar also has a first-class batting average of over 35.

[PKBasu]

Actually Sundar's best match was the Duleep Trophy final of 2017-18 -- three seasons ago. He took 11 wickets in that match and made 88 and 42, so was Man of the Match. THAT was a very impressive performance. I'm surprised he hasn't played more first-class cricket since. Just a sign that first-class cricket (Ranji Trophy) is so downplayed in our cricket these days. All that most players want to focus on is IPL.

[prasen9]

Just by virtue of being at the right place at the right time. Only T20I/ODI people were asked to stay back. That is why Natarajan and Sundar are in play but not the Ranji pacers/spinners of better stature. In the few matches he got, Sundar averages around 27 with the ball and around 31 with the bat. Which is sort of close to that of Axar but of course very few matches. Sometimes talented juniors work. Anyway, in this case, we have no choice. Nobody can be brought into the bubble. And, I hope he has used the time to get used to Aussie conditions especially with the bat but also with the ball, wrt bounce, etc.

I doubt he will be in the team playing England unless he does superbly in Gabba (if given a chance). I would actually prefer to see Axar instead of Shahbaz Nadeem because our pacers cannot bat. The spinners have to bat especially if we are playing five bowlers, which we may need to after the heavy toll and the lower fitness due to Covid-19.

[rajitghosh]

Shivam Dune or Vijay Shankar would consider themselves unfortunate that they are not there

[prasen9]

I am unfortunate that I was not there.

Ashwin seems like a no-go

It seems like: Gill, Rohit, Pujara, Rahane, Pant, Mayank, Sundar, Thakur, Saini, Siraj, Natarajan.

A bit of a long tail but with reasonable number of bowlers. Given the weak tail, I could not make space for Saha. Anyway, with four pacers, Pant should be fine.

If Pant, Mayank, Ashwin, and Pujara do not recover from their injuries and all cannot go on, then god save us.

[Atithee]

Doesn’t Dhawan live in Melbourne? Could he be drafted and be within the quarantine exemptions? He would be a good replacement.