On the other hand, newly appointed Test captain Shubman Gill and his GT opening batter Sai Sudharsan will not play the second unofficial game against the England Lions starting from June 6 in Northampton. After announcing the India Test squad for the five-match series in England, BCCI had said both Shubman and Sudharsan will play the second unofficial game. But now it has been learnt from various media reports that the BCCI has advised Gill and Sudharsan to take rest because of the hectic IPL schedule.
Now both of them will travel with the main squad in England. Meanwhile Sarfaraz Khan and Dhruv Jurel may miss out in the second game despite playing exceptionally well in the first unofficial game.
As far as the playing XI for India A is concerned, the opening pair should remain the same with Yashasvi Jaiswal opening the batting with Abhimanyu Easwaran. KL Rahul will be accommodated at number 3 then followed by Karun Nair at number 4 and then Ishan Kishan at number 5 and Nitish Reddy at number 6 respectively.
Shardul Thakur should keep his place as the third pace bowler. Meanwhile Akash Deep can come in place of Harshit Rana and Khaleel Ahmed can replace Anshul Kamboj.
The first four day game between India A and England Lions ended up in a draw. Both the team’s batters played exceptionally well on a proper batting wicket in Canterbury. As far as the India A team is concerned, Karun Nair played an exceptional innings of 204 putting a strong case for him to get selected in the India Test XI against England in the ongoing month. Sarfaraz Khan and Dhruv Jurel played a great supporting role as both of them got out in the 90s and India A scored 557 runs in the 1st innings .
However, the India A fast bowlers had to work really hard on a beautiful batting wicket as England Lions scored 587 runs in the first innings. In the second innings, the India A openers batted brilliantly and Jurel and Reddy too scored half centuries after India A scored 241/2. At the end, the first unofficial game ended in a draw.
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