Why did India pick Ashwin over Sundar in Adelaide? The Indian cricket team made three changes to their playing XI for the 2nd BGT Test in Adelaide to the side that won by 295 runs in the first Test in Perth.
While two changes were expected—as incumbent and senior players Rohit Sharma, who is the captain, and Shubman Gill replaced Dhruv Jurel and Devdut Padikkal after missing the first Test due to personal reasons and injury, respectively—one change was a tactical one: R Ashwin replacing Washington Sundar.
India had stunned everyone by dropping both R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja in the Perth Test and picking young and inexperienced Sundar over the senior duo who share over 800 Test wickets between them. In Perth, Sundar scored 4 and 29 and picked two wickets of tailenders in Australia’s second innings.
Why did India pick Ashwin over Sundar in Adelaide?
He didn’t fare badly in Perth, but his axing in Adelaide was a tactical and strategic call, reveals India’s assistant coach, Ryan ten Doeschate.
After day 1 in Adelaide, ten Doeschate expressed that the management was impressed with Nitish Kumar Reddy’s batting ability in Perth, where the debutant scored 41 & 38*, and hence backed him with the bat in Adelaide, which in turn allowed them to play the senior off-spinner in the XI.
The Dutchman also revealed that the management felt Ashwin is a better off-spinning option for Adelaide conditions than Sundar. Ashwin, who is on his fourth Test tour of Australia, has a good record in Adelaide: 16 wickets in three Tests at an economy of 2.64.
“I guess going into the last Test, we wanted to strengthen the batting, and given what we saw of Nitish in the first Test, we kind of thought we could go with what we perceived to be the guys bowling the best spin at the moment, and we feel Ash (Ashwin) is more likely to get wickets on these conditions,” ten Doeschate said.
Australia are on top in Adelaide after day 1, trailing by only 94 more runs with nine wickets in hand after bowling India out for 180.
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