The five -match Test series between India and England has begun on the Headingley Cricket Ground in Leeds from June 20 (Friday). In this match, England captain Ben Stokes won the toss and decided to bowl first.
Veteran batsman Karun Nair has also got a chance from the Indian team in the Leeds Test match. Karun Nair has gone to play Test cricket after more than 8 years. Earlier, Karun played his last Test against Australia on 25 March 2017 in Dharamshala. After that he has got a chance to play for the first time for India.
Karun Nair missed 77 matches after that Dharamshala Test against Australia. This is the fourth longest gap for India between two Test matches. Karun has beaten Abhinav Mukund in this case, who returned to the team after being out of 56 Test matches. Fast bowler Jaydev Unadkat missed 118 Test matches between 2010 and 2022, the longest gap among Indian players.
The most gap between two Test matches for India
118 Jaydev Unadkat (2010-22)
87 Dinesh Karthik (2010-18)
83 Parthiv Patel (2008-16)
77 Karun Nair (2017-25)*
56 Abhinav Mukund (2011-17)
Sai Sudarshan has also landed in this match, whose debut is a Test match. Sai Sudarshan’s average is just 39.93 in first-class cricket. It is not considered right for a top-order batsman to be less than 40 average in the first class. After a long time, it has been seen when a top order batsman holding a first class average of less than 40 got a Test debut from India. Earlier this was the last time in January 1988, when Vurkeri Raman made a Test debut against the West Indies in Chennai. Then his first class average was less than 40.
If seen, in the last six Test matches played at Leeds’s Headingley Cricket Ground, the team which batted second, won. Two of these matches were won by a margin of innings, while in four matches, the teams successfully scored more than 250 runs.
Indian team’s playing XI in the match: Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudarshan, Shubman Gill (captain), Rishabh Pant (wicketkeeper), Karun Nair, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Jaspreet Bumrah, Mohammad Siraj, famous Krishna.
England’s playing XI in the match: Jack Craulie, Ben Docket, Oli Pope, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Ben Stokes (Captain), Jamie Smith (wicketkeeper), Chris Woakes, Bridan Cars, Josh Tung, Shoaib Bashir.