India have won the toss and chosen to bat in Perth. The big news in their line-up, no Ravichandran Ashwin or Ravindra Jadeja – with 536 and 319 Test wickets respectively.
Jasprit Bumrah acknowledges a bit of moisture in the deck but likes the firmness in the pitch. India has named two fast bowling debutants in place of their champion spinners on this pitch, Washington Sundar is the visitors sole spinner.
Washington Sundar is India’s sole spinner in Perth.Credit: Getty Images
Sundar, you’ll remember his heroics with the bat at the Gabba in 2021, is a man very much in form – he took 11 wickets against New Zealand during the recent Pune Test.
Virat Kohli made the cap presentation to bowling all-rounder Nitish Kumar Reddy earlier and it was Ashwin who handed a cap to Harshit Rana. We saw a bit of Kumar during the India A games and he did have some hustle with the ball. Rana is 22 and comes in for just his 11th first class outing…
Big, possibly series-defining, call from the visitors already.
Indian XI: KL Rahul, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Devdutt Padikkal, Virat Kohli, Rishbabh Pant, Dhruv Jurel, Washington Sundar, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Hashit Rana, Jasprit Bumrah (c), Mohammed Siraj.
Australian XI: Usman Khawaja, Nathan McSweeney, Marnus Labuschagne, Steve Smith, Travis Head, Mitch Marsh, Alex Carey, Pat Cummins (c), Mitch Starc, Nathan Lyon, Josh Hazlewood.
