Ahead of the first Test between India and England at MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai, Ishant Sharma was chosen ahead of Mohammed Siraj. However, Ishant Sharma proved his worth as he scalped his 300th Test wicket.
Ishant became the 3rd Indian pacer to 300 Test wickets. The pacer sent Daniel Lawrence back for just 18. England did go for a review. No bat was involved and the ball struck very low.
It ball crashed into the lower half of middle-stump as Daniel Lawrence missed the flick across the line. He was beaten by the skid and the tail in, and the ball struck him low on the pad.
India's 300-wicket club in Tests:
619 Anil Kumble
434 Kapil Dev
417 Harbhajan Singh
382 R Ashwin*
311 Zaheer Khan
300 Ishant Sharma*
While Ishant is backed with a lot of experience, Siraj was coming after a stunning performance in the series Down Under against Australia.
This selection had not sat down as former Indian opening batsman Gautam Gambhir opined on the two-seamers. He said that if he had to pick, he would choose Siraj as Ishant had not played any red-ball cricket for a very long time.
"Yes I would have picked Siraj. The reason is that Ishant hasn’t played any red-ball cricket for a very long time. Straight IPL and after IPL he has got injured and then he has played only T20 cricket. It’s not like you have got the third seamer in your ranks and you can actually just go on to bowl 12-13 overs a day. You might have to bowl 15-16 overs plus it’s always easy to bowl in T20 cricket but not in red-ball cricket where you gotta make things happen," Gautam Gambhir said.
"You might have to play three seamers with the pink ball at Motera. So I would have definitely built him for Motera or probably for the second Test match and gone with Siraj because Siraj is coming after such a fabulous tour and he has bowled such long spells in Australia as well," Gambhir added.
