Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting urged Team India to play both Shubman Gill and KL Rahul both for the fourth Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. Rahul, who opened in the first two Tests, failed to contribute much for India while Gill could not convert his start in the third Test against Australia as well. With India eyeing the World Test Championship final spot, Ponting said that Gill could open and Rahul could play in the middle order in the Ahmedabad Test as well.
“With someone like KL Rahul having gone out of this side and Shubman Gill having come in, both these guys have played a bit of Test match cricket and you could potentially have both of those guys in the same team,” Ponting said on ICC review. “Maybe Shubman could start at the top and KL could potentially move down into the middle order, because he’s played cricket in those (English) conditions before, albeit at the top of the order. But one thing we know about the UK is that the ball swings for long periods of time during the day. And if the overhead conditions are suitable, then the ball tends to swing right the way through an innings.”
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However, after losing both Tests, Australia bounced back in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy and won the third Test against India by nine wickets to seal its place in the World Test Championship (WTC) final as well. Now, Australia will aim to level the Test series, while India will look to reach the WTC final by winning the fourth Test, beginning March 9.
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“Because it’s just a one-off Test match, it will be really important to pick the team that you think is going to have the most success in those conditions. The Oval can be a really, really good place to bat as long as the sun is out, it’s probably as good a wicket as any in the UK. So I think that’s what it would come down to for India. It would just come down to assessing the conditions and then maybe forgetting about this last series that’s just been played. The conditions that we’re seeing here (in India) are quite extreme. If it was Australia and India, they would both look at the conditions and pick the team that they think was best to win that one-off game,” Ricky Ponting concluded.
