Selection dilemmas for India as they step into a new era under Gill

As always, cricket moves on swiftly. Less than a week after Pat Cummins’ Australian team let slip a second successive World Test Championship (WTC) title at Lord’s as South Africa claimed their first major ICC trophy in 27 years, a little less than 200 miles northwards in the city of Leeds, India will meet host England for the first of five Test matches for the rechristened Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy.

Unmistakably, the focus for this English summer has been India’s visit, to the extent that Lord’s wore a distinct Indian flavour through the WTC final and on day four, after Temba Bavuma’s team lifted the world title they so desperately craved, the attention suddenly diverted to the India-England series was jarring.

It is a marquee series, make no mistake. The might of the Big Three cricket boards and the ICC’s dependency on series between India, England and Australia for revenue sets such contests apart, and there is always intrigue and anticipation around the kind of cricket these teams play against each other.

But what makes this series interesting is the visiting team’s predicament. India, under a new leader in 25-year-old Shubman Gill, step into a new WTC cycle and quite literally a new era sans Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Ravichandran Ashwin with similar mistakes to be avoided. It is a daunting time, but also one for experimenting and risk-taking, should Gill and head coach Gautam Gambhir be up for it. 

Australia recently paid the price for a rejigged batting lineup in the third WTC final, in which the combined failure of their top three ultimately told when South Africa batted a second time and benefitted from the pitch flattening out. India are not in as desperate a situation as Australia were, but they are looking at a new No 3 and No 4. 

Gill, in his first Test in charge, will bat at No 4 where Kohli did some terrific things. The one-down spot looks a shootout between the uncapped B Sai Sudarshan and the returning Karun Nair, given that vice-captain Rishabh Pant usually bats at No 5. But if India need batting cover after Pant, which indicates that both Sudarshan and Nair could be in the fray. 

And yet, more than deciding the nature of a somewhat new-look batting order, it could be the bowlers whom the management select that prove pivotal as the five-match Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy gets underway at on Friday.

Three pacers are a given, but beyond Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj and Prasidh Krishna is where the decision-making turns pivotal. India have often faced this challenge in SENA countries: when none of their allrounders are reliable as wicket-takers in tough conditions, which way do you lean? Even Test titans such as Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja struggled in Australia, South Africa and England. 

The form of Nitish Reddy and Shardul Thakur does not leave much to choose from, even though having two seam-bowling allrounders in an 11 seems both a luxury as well as a problem given that one spot could go to a specialist batsman. The dilemma for India, thus, is whether to go for batting cover in someone like Washington Sundar, but whose offspin is likely to be redundant at Headingley. 

The tone that India set with their bowling selections in England could well determine who they fare in these five Test matches. Beyond this tour, what transpires over this new WTC cycle will be fascinating, especially as India’s bowling resources are not getting any younger. Jadeja is 36, Shardul is 33, Bumrah and Siraj 31 and Kuldeep 30. The fringe players include Krishna, 29, Akash Deep, 28, and the uncapped Arshdeep Singh, who is 26. Washington is 25 and Reddy just 21, but neither looks set to be used much for their bowling, be it home or away. 

England have, as expected, announced their lineup two days before the Test. Ollie Pope has been retained at No 3 following a score of 171 versus Zimbabwe recently, which means that 21-year-old Jacob Bethell misses out. The bowling comprises Chris Woakes, Brydon Carse, Josh Tongue, Shoaib Bashir and the captain Ben Stokes. 

The Leeds Test marks the return of Woakes for the first time since December 2024 while Carse will play his first match on home soil after taking 27 wickets in Pakistan and New Zealand. 

India likely 11: 1 Yashasvi Jaiswal, 2 KL Rahul, 3 B Sai Sudarshan, 4 Shubman Gill (capt), 5 Rishabh Pant (wk), 6 Karun Nair, 7 Ravindra Jadeja, 8 Shardul Thakur, 9 Jasprit Bumrah, 10 Prasidh Krishna, 11 Mohammed Siraj

England 11: 1 Ben Duckett, 2 Zak Crawley, 3 Ollie Pope, 4 Joe Root, 5 Harry Brook, 6 Ben Stokes (capt), 7 Jamie Smith (wk), 8 Chris Woakes, 9 Brydon Carse, 10 Josh Tongue, 11 Shoaib Bashir