When the national selectors sit down here on Thursday to pick the Test squad for next month’s Sri Lanka tour, they would definitely take into account the trouble Pakistani leg-spinner Yasir Shah caused to the Island batsmen recently. That may prompt the selectors to go for a leg-spinner to complement the two offies – R Ashwin and Harbhajan Singh – who are almost sure to be in the squad.
“We have followed how the Sri Lankans struggled against Yasir Shah. The team would love to have a good leg spinner in the team,” a source close to the team management told TOI on Wednesday. “However, one must realize that Shah is perhaps the best leg-spinner going around in the world right now. It’s not easy to match up to him,” added the source.
Railways leggie Karn Sharma had gone with the team on the last two tours but had to pull out of the recently concluded Zimbabwe tour due to a fractured left middle finger. The other leg-spinner in the contention is Amit Mishra who is currently playing for India ‘A’ against Australia ‘A’ in an unofficial ‘Test’ in Chennai. While it is likely that Karn should be fit for the series, the selectors have shown little confidence in Mishra over the past few years. Karn, too, has done little to inspire in the only Test he played in Australia last year and the few limited-over games he has played in the India shirt.
Thus, it will be interesting to see if the selectors go with the wish of the team management and name a leg spinner or they opt for a left-arm spinner instead. If that happens, then the names of Axar Patel and Pragyan Ojha come into the picture as Ravindra Jadeja seems to have fallen off the radar.
However, it is unlikely the selectors are going to be swayed by the tradition of fielding ‘spin-heavy attacks’ in Lanka. Captain Virat Kohli has been vocal about his fascination for genuine pace in his armory. He opted to play three pacers on a docile pitch in the one-off Test against Bangladesh last month. And the trend is more certain to continue. “We can’t think of winning only with spin. We’ll have our pace attack as we had in Bangladesh,” said the source. In that case, Umesh Yadav, Ishant Sharma, Varun Aaron (subjected to his recovery from viral fever) and Bhuvneshwar Kumar are set to fly to Lanka.
Other than trying to get a balanced bowling attack, the selectors will have to look for a reserve wicketkeeper with Wriddhiman Saha going on a full tour as the first choice for the first time since MS Dhoni’s retirement last December. Naman Ojha, with a barrage of big scores in first-class cricket, is likely to edge the other contenders.
Team to depart on August 1
The departure of the team has been preponed by a couple of days. The squad will now be leaving for Sri Lanka on August one. There will be no preparatory camp for the team.