The Indian cricket team is currently playing the 3rd Test match against the England cricket team at Headingley in Leeds. Indian skipper Virat Kohli ended his losing streak in tosses against his English counterpart Joe Root today. Kohli gave some interesting updates on Ashwin, including one on off-spin bowling all-rounder R Ashwin.
Virat Kohli won the toss and elected to bat first in Leeds. The Indian cricket team has fond memories of playing at this venue. They had won last two Test matches against England on this ground. However, in the third Test of the ongoing series, India has got off to a disappointing start after the skipper won the toss. KL Rahul and Cheteshwar Pujara have returned to the dressing room in the first five overs only.
While Rahul and Pujara’s dismissals have become talking points already, there was another debate in the cricket universe after the toss. Some fans wondered if the Indian cricket team could have picked R Ashwin in the playing XI. However, the same did not happen. Here’s what Virat said at the toss about Ashwin:
“We’re playing with the same eleven. We thought about it (bringing Ashwin in) but the pressure of the extra seamer is very important as we saw in the last game. Jadeja will come into this game a lot more in this game than he did in the previous,” Virat Kohli was quoted as saying by Sportskeeda.
Virat Kohli persists with strategy of playing four fast bowlers
As Virat Kohli stated, the strategy of playing four fast bowlers has worked for the Indian cricket team in this series. Hence, they did not decide to alter it. Here is the Indian playing XI for the Headingley Test match:
Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli (c), Ajinkya Rahane, Rishabh Pant (wk), Ravindra Jadeja, Ishant Sharma, Mohammad Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Siraj.
