Rahul, Jurel to leave early for Australia and play second A game

India batters KL Rahul and Dhruv Jurel will arrive in Australia a week earlier than the rest of India’s Test squad to gain some match time ahead of the five-Test series beginning on November 22 in Perth.

Rahul and Jurel will line up for the India A side led by Ruturaj Gaikwad for the second and final four-day fixture to be played from November 7 at the MCG. India A lost the first game by seven wickets in Mackay, where the last day was marred by a ball-change controversy although Ishan Kishan escaped a dissent charge after an argument with the on-field umpire.

Rahul was left out of India’s XI following their defeat to New Zealand in the first Test in Bengaluru, where he scored 0 and 12. Rahul made way for the returning Shubman Gill for the second and third Tests of the series where India were blanked 3-0, their first whitewash at home in 24 years.

Meanwhile, Jurel, who made his Test debut against England earlier this year, hasn’t featured in any of the five home Tests since Rishabh Pant’s comeback. He has had two red-ball outings since the conclusion of the England series in March, one Duleep Trophy game and then the Irani Cup last month. He managed only 2 and 0 in the Duleep Trophy fixture before scoring a brisk 93 off 121 balls against Mumbai.

The decision to send both players early to get some match practice is pertinent given the Indian team cancelled their only intra-squad warm-up fixture for centre-wicket match simulation in Perth.

“We are travelling with a squad of 19 players and only three days were allotted to us. I don’t know how much workload we can get in those three days in terms of getting everyone prepared,” captain Rohit Sharma had reasoned on Sunday.

“The management feels that we’d rather have a match simulation where batters can spend more time in the middle and the bowlers can bowl a lot of balls. That is something that we, as a team, feel more comfortable doing rather than playing a practice game because game time is not a problem.”

The Indian team is set to depart for Australia on November 10, and will train at the old venue in Perth, the WACA, ahead of the series opener at the Optus Stadium, where they last played on the 2018-19 tour, which they won 2-1.

India are likely to miss Rohit for that opening game because of his unavailability due to personal reasons and his direct replacement in the squad is Abhimanyu Easwaran, who scored 7 and 12 in the first A game after scoring four straight first-class hundreds at the start of the Indian domestic season, unless they decide to rejig the batting order.