Ashwin is being thought-about as a possible inclusion because the third spinner within the lineup, alongside Ravindra Jadeja and Kuldeep Yadav, significantly as a result of anticipation of a gripping pitch on the MA Chidambaram Stadium.
His potential to create issues for skilled Australian batsmen like David Warner and Steve Smith additional strengthens his case.
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Ashwin has had appreciable success towards Warner previously, dismissing him 11 instances in Check matches. To counter Ashwin’s off-breaks, Warner even switched to batting right-handed in a current second ODI towards India in Indore.
Steve Smith, a constantly high-scoring participant in ODIs, has additionally confronted difficulties towards Ashwin, significantly in Check cricket.
Therefore, it could not be an enormous shock to see Ashwin getting a nod forward of Thakur within the first match at Chepauk.
Ashwin, who changed injured Axar Patel in India’s World Cup squad, bowled for an prolonged session on the nets right here to Shreyas Iyer, Ishan Kishan, Thakur amongst others.
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Earlier than rolling his arm, the Chennai man additionally spent appreciable time at nets sprucing his batting abilities.
Ashwin began the batting session dealing with throwdowns from the side-arm specialists within the squad earlier than testing his abilities towards common India bowlers and a set of native web bowlers.
Ashwin, who has all the time been a candy timer of the ball, impressed together with his potential to play the aerial photographs, one thing that will probably be helpful if he comes out to bat at No. 8.
It was the second apply session of India forward of their match towards Australia, and everybody besides Shubman Gill turned up for the motion.
Star batter Virat Kohli regarded in advantageous contact throughout his almost 45 minutes stint at nets, unfurling his trademark drives towards pacers and throwdown specialists.
Shreyas, Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya, KL Rahul, Ravindra Jadeja and Kishan too had a very good hit.
Whereas Surya, Kishan and Jadeja regarded in advantageous contact enjoying these massive photographs, Iyer was sometimes examined with short-pitched deliveries, which he linked properly whereas enjoying the pull photographs over sq. leg and deep fine-leg.
Later, the bowlers comparable to Jasprit Bumrah, Kuldeep, Thakur too devoted a little bit of time to strengthen their talents with the bat.
Rahul, who returned to top-level motion in the course of the Asia Cup after a protracted harm layoff, was additionally seen spending a while with head coach Rahul Dravid, who gave the batter some throw-ins.
Among the many bowlers, pacers Mohammed Shami and Mohammed Siraj got here out with full depth and infrequently troubled Iye and Thakur with deliveries that moved away from the batters.
Nonetheless, there was no additional preparatory session towards the left-arm tempo of Mitchell Starc. It could be recalled that Indian batters had engaged in full-scale coaching in the course of the Asia Cup to sort out Pakistan left-arm pacer Shaheen Shah Afridi.
Starc was deadly within the warm-up match towards Netherlands, taking a hat-trick whereas swinging the ball prodigiously in.
Nonetheless, the situations in Chennai could possibly be vastly completely different from the wet Thiruvananthapuram.
Starc has historically troubled the Indian batters. In India, he has taken 12 wickets in eight ODIs, together with a fifer, towards the Males in Blue at a mean of 39.41 and his economic system stands at 6.50.
(With PTI Inputs)
