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Cricket PlayersWatch: Virat Kohli hands Ishan Kishan his maiden Test cap, Rohit Sharma does the honours for Yashasvi Jaiswal
Yashasvi Jaiswal and Ishan Kishan received their caps from Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli respectively.
India have handed Test debuts to Yashasvi Jaiswal and Ishan Kishan in their first Test against the West Indies in Dominica. Both players were handed their caps just before toss on Wednesday. While it is an international debut for Jaiswal, Kishan will now be playing his first Test after has played 14 ODIs and 27 T20Is in his career.
The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) tweeted photos of the two players receiving their maiden Test caps. Captain Rohit Sharma was the one who handed Jaiswal the cap while former skipper Virat Kohli did the honours for Kishan.
Kishan has taken the wicketkeeper's duties in the match, a role that India are struggling find a good suitor for in the absence of Rishabh Pant. KS Bharat had been behind the wickets for India in five Tests, all of which were against Australia. While the first four games in the series that India hosted, the fifth was the World Test Championship in which they lost by 209 runs. While Bharat impressed with his glovework, he could score just 129 runs in five Tests at an average of 18.42 with a highest score of 44.
Jaiswal, meanwhile, takes veteran Cheteshwar Pujara's place in the eleven, although he will open with captain Rohit when India bat, with Shubman Gill coming in at No.3. While the decision to drop Pujara was criticised by many, the inclusion of Jaiswal was seen as a positive. Jaiswal has scored 1845 runs in just 15 first class games with an average of a whopping 80.21, having scored nine centuries.
Rohit had said earlier that Gill wants to bat at No.3. "Gill will play at No. 3 because Gill himself wants to play at number 3. He discussed with Rahul (Dravid) that I have played all my cricket at 3 and 4. I think I can do better for my team if I bat at number 3. And it is good for us too because it becomes an opening combination of left and right," said Rohit on the eve of the first Test.
"So I think we will try to do this and hopefully this will go on for a long time. Because we have been looking for a left-hander for many years. So now that we have got that left-hander, let's hope he performs well for the team. And he (Jaiswal) can really make that spot his own," he added.
