File photo of Shubman Gill (Getty Images) India had made a solitary change to their playing XI for the Boxing Day Test against Australia. But it was a change that changed the complexion of the order as Shubman Gill sat out with Washington Sundar coming in. It allowed India to have two spinners in the lineup but most interestingly, Rohit Sharma moved to the top of the batting order and KL Rahul to the No.
3 role. Rohit Sharma press conference: On his batting, captaincy, future, Rishabh Pant’s shot and more After five intense days of cricket, Australia clinched the contest in thrilling fashion, winning by 184 runs to take 2-1 lead in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy . With 340 runs to get, India started poorly, losing three wickets before Lunch.
Just when they had regained composure, India lost seven wickets in the final session to go down by 184 runs. In the post-match press conference, India captain Rohit Sharma explained the reasoning behind the Gill change. He stated that the right-handed batter was not dropped but the intention was to have cushion with an extra bowler who could also score runs.
"I had a chat with him there is no way when you're leaving someone out, for whatever reason it is, you will have a chat and the chat was clearly he was not dropped. We just wanted to have that extra bit of cushion in the bowling and hence we opted for an allrounder which would not weaken our batting lineup. Compromising a batter for a bowler was not something that I wanted to do," said .
