India cricket team have decided to go in to the IND vs AUS 2nd ODI with an unchanged playing XI in Adelaide. Australia won the toss and have opted to bowl first in what is a must-win contest for India to keep their hopes of winning the series alive. India’s unchanged combination means Kuldeep Yadav will be warming the bench once again.
India playing XI for IND vs AUS 2nd ODI
Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill (C), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer (VC), Nitish Kumar Reddy, KL Rahul (WK), Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Harshit Rana, Arshdeep Singh, Mohammed Siraj
On bench: Dhruv Jurel, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Kuldeep Yadav, Prasidh Krishna
Despite all the clamour around leaving out one of their best bowlers, Shubman Gill has decided to persist with the same line-up was fielded in Perth. In spite of being in the form of his life, Kuldeep has been left to warm the bench once again as India have decided to go with three pacers and all-rounders each in their playing XI.
The onus will be on the Indian top-order which completely failed to fire in the rain-hit IND vs AUS 1st ODI. Rohit and Virat, who returned to international cricket after nearly 8 months, were dismissed for 8 and 0 respectively. There will be enormous pressure on the duo to get some big runs in Adelaide amid the uncertainty over their future in ODIs.
Shreyas will also be under pressure to deliver in the middle-order after he was dismissed rather cheaply in Perth. It would also be interesting to see if Gambhir and Gill opt to send Nitish Reddy, who will be playing his 2nd ODI, ahead of Rahul at number 5, like they did so in the previous game.
As for the pace department, Siraj and Arshdeep put on a good show in the previous game and will be hoping to do the same in Adelaide as well. All-format player Harshit will have to pull up his socks and be more economical after the thrashing he was handed in Perth.
