Mohali: Young Rishabh Pant will strive to seal a slot in the World Cup squad even as India fret about their top-order woes ahead of the fourth ODI against Australia, here Sunday.
Providing opportunities to all Cup hopefuls would be on Virat Kohli’s mind and the team management is expected to ring in a few changes in the playing XI in the remaining two matches of the series.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni seem to have played his last international game in Ranchi and now Pant gets a chance to book his boarding pass for the London-bound flight.
In earlier ODIs, Pant had played purely as batsman but with Dhoni being rested, Pant will get a chance to don the big gloves.
The Indian playing XI will also have Bhuvneshwar Kumar Sunday as he replaces Mohammed Shami, who was hit on the leg in his follow through during the third match.
Shami completed his spell but since he will be sharing the new ball with Jasprit Bumrah in England, it is natural to give him precautionary rest.
However, what will keep the Indian team worried is the batting form of the top-order, save skipper Kohli, who has been lock, stock and barrel above everyone in his team.
Kohli has 283 runs in three games with two hundreds and the next best in the Indian team is Kedar Jadhav with 118 runs.
Rohit Sharma is undergoing a rare slump in ODIs, having scored only 51 runs in three innings. Even worse is Ambati Rayudu’s performance at No 4 with aggregate of 33 runs in three games.
Shikhar Dhawan’s struggles are well-documented and he has scored only 22 runs in three games.
Dhawan and Rayudu’s form should be a cause of concern even though both are certainties as far as place in the World Cup squad is concerned.
While Kohli is not a great advocate of wholesale changes, KL Rahul is also expected to get a look-in but it is not clear who would he replace — Dhawan or Rayudu.
India will be worried about Aussie leg-spinner Adam Zampa, who despite conceding lot of runs, has managed to get Kohli and Dhoni on multiple occasions.
Teams
India: Virat Kohli (Captain), Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma, Ambati Rayudu, Kedar Jadhav, Vijay Shankar, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Ravindra Jadeja, Yuzvendra Chahal, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Rishabh Pant.
Australia: Aaron Finch (Captain), Usman Khawaja, Peter Handscomb, Shaun Marsh, Glenn Maxwell, Marcus Stoinis, Ashton Turner, Jhye Richardson, Adam Zampa, Andrew Tye, Pat Cummins, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Alex Carey, Nathan Lyon, Jason Behrendorff.
Match Starts: 1:30 pm.
PTI