India made four changes for the dead rubber, resting regular No. 3 batter Virat Kohli and including Gaikwad, who has made his name as an opener in the IPL. Many expected the 25-year-old to replace Kohli at No. 3. However, at the toss, Sharma said that Gaikwad would open alongside Ishan Kishan.
In an interaction with Cricbuzz, Jadeja said about the same:
Jadeja believes that the decision to bring himself down the order probably came about from the experiences and hardships he faced as a youngster. He said the 34-year-old doesn’t want his teammates to go through the same. Jadeja added:
Rohit Sharma started his career as a fluent but inconsistent middle-order batter till MS Dhoni tried him out at the top of the order.
He has been India’s best opener since then, and is certain to continue at the spot at the upcoming T20 and 50-over World Cups.
Gaikwad, meanwhile, still has a long way to go to cement his place in the white-ball team. However, asking the youngster to open could be the team management’s way of trying out something new.
Ruturaj Gaikwad struggles, Rohit Sharma scores 7
The experiment to promote Gaikwad didn’t reap fruits immediately, as he got out for 4 (8). Rohit Sharma didn’t come out to bat at No. 3 either, allowing Shreyas Iyer to come out instead. However, even the captain looked far from his best and got out after a sedate 15-ball seven.
India, however, recovered well from the shaky start to set a target of 185 for the visitors.
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