England in India, February-March 2021

[indiansportsfan]

I think top 6 will remain the same, barring an injury to Gill, in which case he might be replaced with Mayank. Mayank though seemed to be short on confidence in Australia, so not sure he will do well here. On bowling front, Bumrah will almost certainly come in, and if Shami is also fit and ready, he should also come in; so it should be Thakur for the 3rd seamer's spot, both because he can get more swing in helpful conditions and also because he can contribute more with the bat. That is what common sense would dictate; however the team management does like SIraj a lot, so he might come in too.

[rajitghosh]

Team for last 2 tests is announced. Shardul dropped. Shami not fit. Umesh may be taken based on fitness. So I guess for the pink ball test Bumrah, Ishant and Siraj would play. Kuldeep may be back for the last test. Nadeem is also dropped. Tail would be quite long again unless Axar can play an innings of significance. Remember if India has to reach the World Test Championship final they can't afford to lose any of these matches and has to win at least one. Not easy given that one match is a pink ball match. As such if this series if drawn India doesn't deserve to be in the final since the Pataudi Trophy would remain with England. That makes New Zealand and England 1 and 2 and India 3rd with India having won their last 3 series against Australia. Kind of resembles the rankings of the last ODI Word Cup.

[prasen9]

We could have messed up one match and we did that in Chennai with the stupid pitch in the first test. Now, I hope we can do as much of a batting pitch as possible at Ahmedabad so that we do not have batting collapses and get a draw. Then, the second test at Ah. can be a turner.

Stupid to drop Shardul. Clearly, the team management does not care for batting abilities from #8-11. This is why we have a bad lower tail. Shardul is no worse than Siraj and may be even better under swinging conditions.

Here's hoping that Hardik is bowling again regularly and can play in Ahmedabad. If they do not know if Umesh is fit or not, how did they get him in the team? Why is he not in the NCA like Shami and Saini so that they can monitor their fitness?

This is a solid team in England and they will be reinforced with Bairstow, Crawley, and Archer coming back. We cannot have stupid selections weaken the team. We need our best team to fight them. Oh, well.

[sameerph]

Anderson will also come back I suppose.

Btw, why everyone is talking about extra seamer for day night test? Does the pink ball swing much more than red ball and does not suit spinners at all whatever be the nature of pitch?
Is there any data point as to how seamers have done much better than spinners in pink ball tests?

[prasen9]

In order for the pink ball not to disintegrate, the pitch has to have grass cover and this then helps seamers. I do not have large data and perhaps there is no large data because there have been only about 14 matches with varying venues such as Adelaide and Dubai. So, I do not know how good the aggregation is.

Having said that, here maybe something that is useful to you: Pink ball seams more. Let me know. Or if you have some specific request, I can try to find the data.

[sameerph]

No. That is fine. I was not knowing having to keep extra grass on the pitch for pink ball. That explains why extra seamer may be needed.

[Kumar]

Why drop Shardul! Is he going to be in bubble? That is just stupid! He gets the most wickets in single match in Australia and scores the highest runs in first innings!

Would have played him in pink test ! Guess bumrah comes in for kuldip! I agree, Should have bought in Shardul for Siraj as well

[indiansportsfan]

As expected, our selectors/team management do not show basic common sense. So this was kind of par for the course.

[Sin Hombre]

Rajit, in the case of a drawn series, Australia qualifies as 2nd, India will be 3rd and England will be 4th. England needs to win both the remaining tests to qualify.

India is currently 2nd; win both tests and we finish 1st, win one draw one and we finish 2nd.


On Shardul being dropped, I would read it as Hardik is going to play the next test.

So we will go with

Pant
Hardik
Ashwin
Axar
Ishant
Bumrah

[PKBasu]

Hardik playing the next test is a very interesting possibility. It would lend a lot of stability to the side, and improve the batting greatly. I imagine he would be only a fifth bowler (albeit one capable of taking wickets occasionally, perhaps more so than Washington). I think Umesh being picked ahead of Ishant for a home test (with "rest" being the excuse) is also a live possibility. Would add a bit of zing to the tail's batting too.

[indiansportsfan]

Hardik is not even bowling in ODIs/T20s and having him bowl in Tests, where the bowling load is a lot more sounds like a risky move. However I think Kohli and folks are really desperate to make it to WTC final, so I guess it's a gamble worth taking. Even then, his workload will likely be limited so our frontline pace bowlers (Bumrah and Ishant/Umesh) will have to bowl a bulk of overs.

[PKBasu]

3 months ago, on 29th November 2020, Hardik bowled 4 overs in an ODI against Australia, taking 1/24 -- picking up the wicket of Steve Smith, no less. That was nearly 3 months before the start of the 3rd test at Motera. He was MoM (for 92* off 76 balls) in the next ODI, played the T20Is in Australia, and then has been recovering at home -- until he was picked to rejoin the test squad for this series. Presumably, he has progressively bowled more in the nets over time, and is ready for a light load of test bowling too.

[prasen9]

Hardik bowled for 30 minutes in the nets. Hardik bowling news.

[Kumar]

In order for the pink ball not to disintegrate, the pitch has to have grass cover and this then helps seamers. I do not have large data and perhaps there is no large data because there have been only about 14 matches with varying venues such as Adelaide and Dubai. So, I do not know how good the aggregation is.

Having said that, here maybe something that is useful to you: Pink ball seams more. Let me know. Or if you have some specific request, I can try to find the data.

Why are we not using white ball? Is it because it will not last the 80 overs?

[prasen9]

I don't know. Good question. They want to play in white clothes in tests. So, they need a pink ball for contrast. They should just do away with this and play in colored clothes and a white ball.