Looks like the team manegement is unlikely to take any chances and stick to the experienced pairing of and Ajinkya Rahane and Cheteshwar Pujarafor the Boxing Day Test against South Africa, which will kickstart from December 26th at the SuperSport Park in Centurion. India’s head coach Rahul Dravid has extended his support to Ajinkya Rahane, who has been going through a lean patch in his career.
Rahane has been woefully short of runs lately and his poor performances was the reason that his place in the line-up came under the scanner for the same. In fact, Rahane was replaced by Rohit Sharma as India’s new vice-captain in the longest format of the game.
Though, Dravid didn’t answer whether Rahane will play or not, but he said that the 33-year-old batter is in a “really good space.” During the virtual press conference ahead of the first Test match, Dravid also opened up about the “positive” chats he had with the veteran batter. He said:
“Conversations with Ajinkya Rahane have been very positive, have been very good. I think he has trained really well this week, practiced really well. It’s been no different to actually any conversations with most of the players. And ya, he seems to be in a really good space,”
India’s major concern in South Africa is likely to their batting order, considering the fact that the middle-order batsmen Rahane and Pujara are both struggling to make runs. Also with Shreyas Iyer in red-hot form, it will be a tough decision for the Indian team management to select the playing XI for the first Test match.
When Dravid was asked about how easy or difficult it would be for him to decide the playing XI, the Indian head coach made it clear that the Indian side isn’t ‘scared’ to make tough calls. He said:
“I look at it as a great opportunity for anyone for that matter whether you are in form or out of form… It’s always something you look forward to as a batsman, to be honest, playing in conditions away from home and having that opportunity to do well and test yourself against a really good opposition in their home conditions. I think a lot of your career is defined by those kinds of performances,”
He added:
“It’s never easy to leave out players. We’ve got some real quality in our squad. You know, every one of the 18 players we are carrying here is a really good player. Obviously, we have to make decisions and only 11 can play and sometimes we have to make [tough] calls,”
