Indian great Sunil Gavaskar reckons the Virat Kohli-led might drop one spinner from their playing XI. The Indian team had picked their final XI on Thursday in which they selected both of their spinners in Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja and picked three seamers – Jasprit Bumrah, Ishant Sharma and Mohammed Shami.
However, it remained overcast on the whole opening day and the play was finally abandoned. The toss was earlier postponed and the first session of the day was called off due to rain. Thus, the rain did play a killjoy for the opening day of the much-awaited WTC final clash between India and New Zealand.
If there is any kind of weather change, the team is allowed to change their playing XI before the toss. In fact, it is expected to be cloudy throughout the WTC final and thus the Little Master believes India will replace one of their spinners with a seamer. If it happens, then Mohammed Siraj has a good chance of playing in the WTC final and it will be interesting to note the management on whom they would leave between Ashwin and Jadeja.
Ashwin had scalped 12 wickets in three Test matches against Australia whereas Jadeja has improved his batting a lot in the last couple of years. Thus, it will be a good headache for the Indian team’s think tank. However, Gavaskar feels India might ponder including an extra batsman and if that is the case, Hanuma Vihari’s name will be discussed.
“See, they might have announced the team yesterday, [but] nothing is finalized until the captains share the sheets with each other during the toss. So, you can change the team till the very last moment. As a captain, when I used to be confused between playing a spinner or an extra batsman, I used to see the opposition’s eleven and scratch and change the team on my paper just before the toss,” Gavaskar told Aaj Tak.
“So, the eleven can be changed anytime before the toss. So I feel like maybe they’ll think of playing another batsman because of the weather. Because these conditions are suitable for New Zealand fast bowlers so Rishabh Pant is at six, he might shift to seven and an extra batsman might play. Seeing this weather, one spinner might be dropped.”
