India captain, Rohit Sharma, has confirmed that he will have a new opening partner in the first Test match against West Indies. The series, which marks India's first in the ICC World Test Championship 2023-25 cycle, is set to begin in Dominica on July 12. Sharma revealed that he will be joined by 21-year-old left-hander Yashasvi Jaiswal at the top of the order. In light of Jaiswal's inclusion, Sharma confirmed that his current opening partner, Shubman Gill, will move down to No.3 in the batting order. This change was made to fill the spot left vacant by Cheteshwar Pujara, who was not considered for the tour against the West Indies.
According to Sharma, Gill expressed his preference to play at No.3 and discussed it with head coach Rahul Dravid. Gill believes that batting in this position will allow him to contribute more effectively to the team. The skipper also highlighted the advantage of having a left-right opening combination. "For the batting positions, Gill will play at No. 3. He himself has said that, he had a chat with Rahul Dravid and said that he's played his entire career at 3 and 4, and that he can perform better for the team at No. 3. And for us also it becomes better because we have a left-right opening combination. So that is what we'll try to do and hopefully this will go for a long term."We have wanted a left-hander for a long time and we've got one now and lets hope he performs well for the team and can really make his spot his own," Rohit in the pre-match press conference in Dominica.
The venue, which has traditionally favoured spinners, has also helped India make the decision on the bowling combination with R Ashwin set to return, having missed out in the World Test Championship final. "Looking at the wicket, it looks like we'll play with two spinners and three seamers. Because what we've seen here, 2017 was the last Test played here and lot of wickets taken by the spinners. Having practiced here as well and with the bounce, we feel that we have to go with the 3-2 combination," said Rohit. "All these guys were in the radar and the selectors were watching them closely, I'm glad they could be rewarded," he remarked on the youngsters picked for the series."There are also a couple of guys who missed out but unfortunately you can get only 15-16 players but everyone's time will come. Looking forward, Indian cricket desperately needed a lefthander and we found a very good player in Jaiswal. He looks very promising and so is Ruturaj. Gill has obviously been playing good cricket for a year now and hope he continues his good form. Ruturaj has good potential in red-ball cricket, he has shown us in T20 cricket what he can do. It's time for him to show...and pretty sure he is also looking forward to getting more and more runs for the Indian team. It's always good for Indian cricket when you have guys like these coming in."The captain also addressed the issue of the pace attack being thin on experience, citing that workload management is critical for the amount of cricket Indian players play.
