Cricket fans and critics are excited to witness the inaugural World Test Championship (WTC) final between India and New Zealand at Southampton starting from June 18.
Though India looks like a formidable team to compete with and are positioned at the top of the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) Test rankings, uncertainty over the opening slots for the side are an issue.
While veteran opener Rohit Sharma averages around 27 after 20 overseas red ball games, Shubman Gill hasn’t ever played in England. The other choice opener Mayank Agarwal hasn’t been consistent with his performances.
Former Indian cricketer Yuvraj Singh recently, in an interview, opined that India should go with Rohit and Gill as the first preference to start their innings.
“Rohit Sharma is very experienced now in Test matches. He has almost 7 hundreds as an opener. But both Rohit and Shubman Gill have not opened in England ever,” Yuvraj told Sports Tak.
The 39-year-old also pointed out that both would need to adjust to the swing of Duke balls and get used to the conditions quickly.
“They know the challenge, the Dukes’ Ball swings early. They have to get used to the conditions quickly,” Yuvraj stated.
The Chandigarh-born further revealed that the batsmen need to play session by session in England as the bowl swings early before a good afternoon period which is optimum for ticking the scoreboard. The seamers come into play again after tea due to overcast conditions.
“In England, it’s important to take it one session at a time. In the morning, the ball swings and seams, in the afternoon you can score runs, after Tea, it swings again. As a batsman, if you can adapt to these things, you can be successful,” Yuvraj suggested.
The left-hander was earlier in the news when he agreed with Indian head coach Ravi Shastri that the finale of the grand event should be a best of three Tests since Kiwis would have an advantage of playing two red cherry encounters before the culmination of the marquee tournament.
