India coach Gautam Gambhir has refused to guarantee captain Rohit Sharma’s place in the side for fifth Test against Australia.
Rohit was expected to front the media for the pre-match press conference, but was replaced by Gambhir at the last minute in an unusual move.
And when asked directly if the out-of-form skipper would be playing on Friday, Gambhir said decisions on the final XI will be made after looking at the pitch.
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Not locking in the captain for the final Test of the Border-Gavaskar series is a strange move and only fuels speculation the 37-year-old has been axed from the side.
Channel 7 commentator Bharat Sundaresan was shocked by the development.
“Wow. Gautam Gambhir doesn’t confirm if Rohit Sharma is playing tomorrow when asked directly if the captain’s playing. While Rohit is at warm ups shadow-practicing his drive while kicking the football around with his teammates,” he tweeted.
Rohit was also not a part of slips training.
Rohit has struggled massively in Australia.
The 37-year-old is yet to pass 10 in any of his five innings this series, with the run of failures also coming off the back of a poor showing against New Zealand.
He missed the first Test in Perth due to the birth of his child, with superstar bowler Jaspirit Bumrah captaining the side to a brilliant victory.
He returned for the second Test but has been shuffled around the order and returned scores of just 3, 6, 10, 3, and 9.
If Rohit is dumped, it would pave the way for Shubman Gill to return to the side at No.3 and KL Rahul to open the batting alongside Yashavi Jaiswal.
While Gambhir was keeping the XI close to his chest, he did reveal fast bowler Akash Deep is out with a back injury.
More to come …