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This should be the Playing XI for 3rd test :

Y Jaiswal, Yash Rathod, Karun Nair, R Smaran, R Pant, A Badoni, S Jain, K Yadav, M Shami, A Nabi, Gurnoor Brar

Rajkumar Sharma wrote: Wed Nov 26, 2025 4:34 am This should be the Playing XI for 3rd test :

Y Jaiswal, Yash Rathod, Karun Nair, R Smaran, R Pant, A Badoni, S Jain, K Yadav, M Shami, A Nabi, Gurnoor Brar

If only there was a 3rd Test!
In a way good as we would have lost that too. Poor performance from most players in this series.
Gill injury didn’t help. Else, we would have surely won the First test!
But, in this match we were poor. Letting SA go from 246/6 to 489 in first innings, poor batting in both innings, poor bowling etc
Selectors did their bit too by having so many left handers, Reddy as a pure bat, Sai as number 3, too many allrounders….I think we need 5 solid batsmen at least on Indian pitches. Hope lessons are learnt and we choose the right team in the next match.

There is no third test -- which, itself, is disgraceful.

But this 0-2 defeat is the ultimate test cricketing ignominy, losing at home by over 400 runs. Gambhir should immediately hang his head in shame and resign.

Gambhir and Agarkar should be sacked immediately at least from the test scheme of things.

Stupidity to select Nitish Reddy, who is not that useful bowling in India and bats at around 25 runs/innings. Absolute nonsense. To replace Gill. Not a proper batsman. Hope and prayers do not win games.

We need to drive the bozos out first.

Prem wrote: Wed Nov 26, 2025 7:33 am

Rajkumar Sharma wrote: Wed Nov 26, 2025 4:34 am This should be the Playing XI for 3rd test :

Y Jaiswal, Yash Rathod, Karun Nair, R Smaran, R Pant, A Badoni, S Jain, K Yadav, M Shami, A Nabi, Gurnoor Brar

If only there was a 3rd Test!
In a way good as we would have lost that too. Poor performance from most players in this series.
Gill injury didn’t help. Else, we would have surely won the First test!
But, in this match we were poor. Letting SA go from 246/6 to 489 in first innings, poor batting in both innings, poor bowling etc
Selectors did their bit too by having so many left handers, Reddy as a pure bat, Sai as number 3, too many allrounders….I think we need 5 solid batsmen at least on Indian pitches. Hope lessons are learnt and we choose the right team in the next match.

Sorry i didn't knew that its a 2 match test series.
We should debate about test cricket i,e that 5 solid batter in addition to it 5 solid pacers, 5 spinners from domestic ( Ranji & Duleep, India A ) a pace bowling allrounder if available.

We have never been this bad at home. I cannot remember when we were this bad. 0-3 to NZ and 0-2 to RSA back to back. Ignore the series against second-division teams. That does not count. If we will not sack Gambhir and Agarkar after this, when will we?

Yes, we do not have settled batters.

prasen9 wrote: Wed Nov 26, 2025 12:40 pm We have never been this bad at home. I cannot remember when we were this bad. 0-3 to NZ and 0-2 to RSA back to back. Ignore the series against second-division teams. That does not count. If we will not sack Gambhir and Agarkar after this, when will we?

Yes, we do not have settled batters.

For a moment lets accept Gambhir's theory. He wants an allround team with Axar, Sundar, Nitesh, Jadeja holding middle & lower order position in test cricket. Axar started his career as left arm spinner from Gujarat, with some batting ability at 7,8 . Then, Gilchrist brought him as no. 3 for Kings XI
and he served the team with 30s & 40s, but he remained as 7,8 for his domestic team in Ranji, Vijay Hazare. Sundar started his career as opening batter for TN, but he also played most of his domestic games as spinner at 7,8 who can bat. Nitesh Reddy began his career as seam bowler mid 110-120 kph for his domestic side, scored runs at 8,9 as few pacer does in domestic , later Cummins did for SRH just like Gilchrist.

Problem with these players is they did'nt bat at important positions ..4,5,6 or even 3 in longet formats in domestic as a matter of fact they doesn't have that experience which we get from Rahane or Pujara, neither they possess that test mentality. They have been backed up by their IPL captains but they did'nt tried to improve for longer formats, neither their associations supported them. So, overnight you can't make them play in positions of solid batter with intact defence at 3,4,5 in test matches.

Jadeja is the only allrounder who has played at 4 for Saurastra for long time, and his association has played him as allrounder in all formats. He has got 3 triple hundreds in Ranji and has got the idea of batting at middle order. Mistake of Gambhir is he wants Axar, Sundar, Nitesh to do the same but its impossible as they carry T20 Mentality not suitable for Test matches.

Sundar and Axar have scored in domestics almost 50% more runs per innings as Nitish. Nitish never showed that he can bat. His century in Australia was a fluke. We pick on flukes ignoring longer term data - repeated mediocrity with the bat. If you are going to bowl someone only 5 overs or so an innings or even less, then why not pick a pure batter? Especially if you are playing five full bowlers. There is only one word for that. Stupidity.

Very few batters who average 25 in India have become batters. Gambhir's wishful thinking and Agarkar's nepotism and general lack of spine or whatever it is is not going to make Nitish contribute 50s and 100s consistently - or at least as consistently as Iyer, Sarfaraz, Nair, etc. can.

When you ignore reality, you deserve to lose. The cancer in this Gambhir-Agarkar-Gill is that they think they know better than what stark reality shows them in domestics. Many selectors, coaches, etc. have made this mistake. The worst test in the history of cricket is the eye test, which is often used to cover up for rank partiality.

Nair and Sarfaraz should get at least one more series. As should Shami. Shami brings in 7-8 runs more an innnings and that could be the difference between the two teams in a place like Kolkata (two partnerships of 15 runs more, Axar was out both times trying to hit almost every ball).

We should not have lost Kolkata even without Gill and we should have put up a stronger batting unit and not called in Nitish for Gill or Axar. Rank stupidity deserves abysmal failures.

Not even getting started with the other dud: Sai Sudarshan. Why is he not in the ODI team?

prasen9 wrote: Fri Nov 28, 2025 9:57 am Sundar and Axar have scored in domestics almost 50% more runs per innings as Nitish.

No, they haven't. Only 1 hundred for Axar in his 57 appearance, neither a double or triple ton. With such a worst stat in batting you can't slot him as allrounder atleast in purest form of the game. Sundar 46 games just 3 tons..no double or triple ton ..he is no. 3 in Test...fully rubbish. Just 2 ton in 36 games for Nitish. Test format requires solid domestic performers not these beats and pieces who has'nt achieved anything in domestic. Neither their bowling performances are eyecatching. Jadeja , on the other hand has 3 triple ton , 15 tons in domestic...a stat which you requires for an allrounder in test cricket. Beats & Pieces will win us games in T20Is or say in one or two Odi but not in test cricket. Axar, Nitish, Sundar requires enough batting performances in domestic to get slot as test allrounders. IPL performers used to get upperhand but now its massive under Gambhir Agarkar era.

Sundar averages 34 runs/innings, Axar averages 36 , Nitish averages 23.69 in FC cricket. 50% more of 23.69 would give us 35.5. Sundar's 34 is approximately 50% more than Nitish's FC average. Axar's average of 36 is just above that. So, it is a fact that in FC cricket, Axar and Sundar have scored about 50% more runs/innings than Nitish has.

Now, you can argue that I wrote domestic. But, the domestic numbers are also very similar to this if you look at their test averages and subtract it.

No amount of bloviating that you have done above disproves that Sundar and Axar have scored about 50% more runs per innings in FC cricket than Nitish has.

Nitish is no batsman. Getting him to replace Gill was the most bone-headed decision much, much worse than the Sai for Sarfaraz/Nair decision. Sai is a much better batter than all of these allrounders. Nitish hardly bowls in India and is rather useless on useless pitches. Gambhir and Agarkar are downright idiots to include him largely as a batsman. This is the state of affairs we are in.

By performance, our best batters (who are fit) in ODIs are:

Samson, Rohit, Kohli, Kishan, Rahul.

Clearly, the selectors are on their stupid selection policies deciding to junk Samson and Kishan. Bringing in Yashasvi and Gaikwad, both of whom have good List-A careers is justifiable. But, dropping both Samson and Kishan for Gaikwad makes no sense because they have also performed fantastically.

Harshit, Arshdeep earn their spots. But, I would have taken the extra slot to try out Shami.

Washy, Axar, and Kuldeep are our top three spinners. Jadeja is a worse bowler and is slower than Axar. He potentially can give us more runs though at a slower rate. Nitish is the other candidate to replace one of the pacers.

I would rather have dropped/rested Rohit and Kohli and had all of Yashasvi, Jaiswal, Samson, and Ishan in the team. No Pant please. He has not scored as many runs/innings when he got the chance.

Old: Rohit (38), Kohli (37), Jadeja (36), Rahul (33), Kuldeep (30)
Young: Nitish (22), Tilak, Jaiswal, Harshit (23), Jurel (24)

Why we need a third keeper in the ODI team is a mystery. I would play Yashasvi and Gaikwad at the two batting slots.

prasen9 wrote: Sat Nov 29, 2025 4:47 pm Sundar averages 34 runs/innings, Axar averages 36 , Nitish averages 23.69 in FC cricket. 50% more of 23.69 would give us 35.5. Sundar's 34 is approximately 50% more than Nitish's FC average. Axar's average of 36 is just above that. So, it is a fact that in FC cricket, Axar and Sundar have scored about 50% more runs/innings than Nitish has.

Now, you can argue that I wrote domestic. But, the domestic numbers are also very similar to this if you look at their test averages and subtract it.

No amount of bloviating that you have done above disproves that Sundar and Axar have scored about 50% more runs per innings in FC cricket than Nitish has.

Nitish is no batsman. Getting him to replace Gill was the most bone-headed decision much, much worse than the Sai for Sarfaraz/Nair decision. Sai is a much better batter than all of these allrounders. Nitish hardly bowls in India and is rather useless on useless pitches. Gambhir and Agarkar are downright idiots to include him largely as a batsman. This is the state of affairs we are in.

I think the point is not that Nitish is not worse than Axar or Sundar but that they all are not good. So does it make sense to fill team with all rounders when don't have any one good. So that is another failure of Agarkar and co is what Raj is trying to say. At least that is what I could make out of it.

Also one interesting thing is that all three are defying your theory of batters having average 10 points lower in test cricket compared to first class. I think all have better or similar average in test cricket.

prasen9 wrote: Sat Nov 29, 2025 4:58 pm Old: Rohit (38), Kohli (37), Jadeja (36), Rahul (33), Kuldeep (30)
Young: Nitish (22), Tilak, Jaiswal, Harshit (23), Jurel (24)

I think we should categorize into young, middle and old. Where people like Kuldeep and Rahul should be in the middle. Mainly 28-33 which is considered to be peak for the cricketer. I remember you used to do that earlier.

SaniaFan wrote: Sun Nov 30, 2025 2:25 am

prasen9 wrote: Sat Nov 29, 2025 4:47 pm Sundar averages 34 runs/innings, Axar averages 36 , Nitish averages 23.69 in FC cricket. 50% more of 23.69 would give us 35.5. Sundar's 34 is approximately 50% more than Nitish's FC average. Axar's average of 36 is just above that. So, it is a fact that in FC cricket, Axar and Sundar have scored about 50% more runs/innings than Nitish has.

Now, you can argue that I wrote domestic. But, the domestic numbers are also very similar to this if you look at their test averages and subtract it.

No amount of bloviating that you have done above disproves that Sundar and Axar have scored about 50% more runs per innings in FC cricket than Nitish has.

Nitish is no batsman. Getting him to replace Gill was the most bone-headed decision much, much worse than the Sai for Sarfaraz/Nair decision. Sai is a much better batter than all of these allrounders. Nitish hardly bowls in India and is rather useless on useless pitches. Gambhir and Agarkar are downright idiots to include him largely as a batsman. This is the state of affairs we are in.

I think the point is not that Nitish is not worse than Axar or Sundar but that they all are not good. So does it make sense to fill team with all rounders when don't have any one good. So that is another failure of Agarkar and co is what Raj is trying to say. At least that is what I could make out of it.

Also one interesting thing is that all three are defying your theory of batters having average 10 points lower in test cricket compared to first class. I think all have better or similar average in test cricket.

Yes. I have pointed out their domestic four dayer performances. No. 3,4,5, 6 in test requires technically correct , bat for long period of time mentality. Sundar, Axar, Nitish haven't done that in their whole four day career.Neither their bowling looked threat to opponents. Harbhajan had some batting ability, but he performed with ball same goes with Kumble, genuine wicket takers. Ashwin & Jadeja were more then average with the bat , both were matchwinners at home with the ball. Axar, Sundar, Nitish doesn't have that quality.England who are rubbish against spinners can make look Axar champion spinner.These talents are nothing but beats & pieces

Shastri, Rahul Dravid brought a tradition in test cricket, where best spinners & best fast bowlers in domestic will work as net bowlers in every test series. It certainly has vanished with their departure

Just stop IPL. Let Indians play wherever they want. Make everyone play domestics—no exceptions.

We keep giving Bumrah a pass. Every time we needed him especially in that second innings of the Kolkata test, he didn’t show up. Again! Whereas Jansen showed up when SAF needed him.

Drop Bumrah. His pick and choose needs to be discarded. He isn’t that great in crunch situations. Can’t bat can’t field. Just go back and look the tests we have won with and without him. For stats freaks, data doesn’t lie. Exclude West Indies type tests, but feel free to include them too.