Centurion

India has been practising here for a week ahead of the opening match, starting Sunday, and the newly-appointed vice-captain believes that a good start is needed to set the tone in the Rainbow Nation, where it has never won a Test series.

Asked if playing four bowlers, which allows an extra batter in the line-up, becomes a workload management problem for the team, Rahul replied in an affirmative.

“Every team wants to pick up 20 wickets to win a Test match. We have used that tactic and it has helped us in every Test match that we have played away from home,” Rahul said during a virtual media interaction.

“Workload also becomes slightly easier to manage with five bowlers. When you have that kind of quality [in the Indian ranks], I think that we might as well use it,” the opening batter gave a hint that a fourth pacer would play.

Shardul Thakur, because of his superior batting skills, holds an advantage over Ishant Sharma, meaning that only one among Shreyas, Rahane and Hanuma Vihari will get a look in. Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Cheteshwar Pujara, skipper Virat Kohli and Rishabh Pant select themselves in the eleven at the moment.

“It is obviously a very difficult decision to make. Speaking about Ajinkya, he has been an important member of the Test team; he has played very, very crucial knocks in his career,” Rahul waxed eloquent about his senior teammate. “In the last 15-18 months, he has played some crucial knocks – that partnership with Pujara at Lord’s which was important for us in winning the Test match. Shreyas has taken his chances and got a brilliant hundred [along with a fifty against New Zealand] in Kanpur. He is very exciting. Hanuma has done the same for us, so it is a tough decision.”

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