Team India is now going to embark on its next mission. After the IPL, the final of the World Test Championship ie WTC 2023 will be played from Wednesday. In this, a great match will be played between Team India, captained by Rohit Sharma, and Australia, captained by Pat Cummins. Meanwhile, the complete suspense has been kept till a day before the match regarding what will be the playing XI of Team India. That is when captain Rohit Sharma will enter the ground for the toss at 3 pm according to Indian time, only then it will revealed what will be the playing XI of the Indian team. Meanwhile, the good thing for Team India is that before the final of the World Test Championship, it played a series of four Test matches along with Australia. The only difference is that the last series was played in India and this time the final will be played in England. However, not much has changed in the Indian team since the last series.
Talking about the series of four Test matches played between India and Australia, Ajinkya Rahane was not there in it. He was walking out of the team, but in IPL 2023, Ajinkya Rahane played some such powerful innings that he was completely covered. There was a time in IPL when Ajinkya Rahane had the highest strike rate among all the players in IPL. Only after that Team India was announced the World Test Championship and Ajinkya Rahane enters the Indian Test team. Suryakumar Yadav was also a member of Team India in the four-Test series, although it is another matter that this time he has not been included in Team India for the WTC final. But he is included in the list of standby players. Ajinkya Rahane will be included in the playing XI, but Suryakumar Yadav may not be able to play.
Not only this, Shardul Thakur was also not in Team India in that series, he was out of Team India not because of poor performance or injury, but because of his marriage, but now he has been selected back for the final. He should be expected to be a part of the playing XI and play for Team India. Ishan Kishan was also included in Team India for India vs Australia series, but he continued to sit out in the four-match series. He did not get a chance to play a single match. After this, when the Indian team was announced for the WTC final, he was not in that team, but after the announcement of the team, it was learned that KL Rahul was injured and would not be able to play in the World Test Championship along with the IPL. Ishan Kishan enters the team as a replacement. Although it is difficult to say whether he will be in the playing XI or KS Bharat will be seen playing in the final, because all the matches of the four-match Test series were played by KS Bharat, the possibility of his playing is more visible.
Another major change after India vs Australia series is that Kuldeep Yadav, who was earlier in the squad, has also been dropped. The reason for this is that the team already has Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin, and Akshar Patel. Also, there is only one match to be played and there is little chance that all three spinners will be part of the team, so there was no point in taking Kuldeep Yadav. It is believed that this is why Kuldeep Yadav has been kept out of the team for the time being. Ruturaj Gaikwad was already kept in the team as a standby but now he is out of the team due to his marriage.
Full India squad for WTC Final: Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, Ravichandran Ashwin, KS Bharat, Ravindra Jadeja, Ishan Kishan, Akshar Patel, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, Shardul Thakur, Jaydev Unadkat, Umesh Yadav.
Standby players: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Mukesh Kumar, Suryakumar Yadav.