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The Indian cricket team is expected to leave for Australia at least two weeks prior to the first Test starting November 22 in Perth and will be playing one or two intra-squad matches against their ‘A’ team colleagues as a tune-up to the opening fixture. The Indian senior team’s home Test series against New Zealand will end on November 5 in Mumbai if the third match goes into the final day. It is understood that the Test squad will be leaving from Mumbai few days after the series and just like it happened during the last tour of South Africa, the BCCI could have a four-day game between India and India A, which people in the know of things feel will provide Rohit Sharma‘s men with quality match simulation.
The India A team is also supposed to play a couple of A Tests and that particular squad, comprising the country’s bench strength, is expected to leave the Indian shores by October 25 for its series.
The BCCI has over the years witnessed a decline in quality of practice matches and there came a time during Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s tenure as Test captain when most of these tour games got unofficial status so that all 15 in the squad could bat and bowl.
Earlier, these matches — normally of three-day duration — would have first-class status.
It was before the 2021 World Test Championship final in England, during the peak COVID-19 crisis, that the senior team introduced the concept of intra-squad game in proper whites and with umpires, but the A team shadow tours were stopped during that phase.
It was during the 2023-24 series in South Africa that both India A and India were present in South Africa at the same time.
In between the two ‘A’ Tests, the second-string did take on the main team before the latter’s opening game at the Centurion.
“Normally, home countries nowadays don’t want to provide their best domestic talent for practice. It always helps in quality match practice if a bunch of India hopefuls are pitted against the stars. These are players knocking on the doors and eager to perform,” a BCCI insider said.
Before the second Test in Adelaide from December 6-10, which is a pink ball affair, the India senior team will play a two-day day/night pink ball game at the Manuka Oval in Canberra on November 30 and December 1 against Prime Minister’s XI, to prepare for the main fixture.
This will be a time when two separate Indian teams will be in two different countries at the same time.
As the Test team gears up for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy with a World Test Championship final at stake, the Suryakumar Yadav-led T20 team will play 4 matches in South Africa between November 8-15.
It is expected that the squad that is playing against Bangladesh will be retained for that series.
The India ‘A’ team for Australia will be selected after the first round of Ranji Trophy games (from October 11-14).
The senior national selection committee will also pick an India U-25 squad next week for the Emerging Asia Cup, which will be held in Muscat this year.
India’s Test Tour of Australia First Test: November 22-26, Perth Second Test: December 6-10, Adelaide Third Test: December 14-18, Brisbane Fourth Test: December 26-30, Melbourne Fifth Test: January 3-7, Sydney.
India’s T20I Tour of South Africa 1st T20I: November 8 (Durban) 2nd T20I: November 10 (Gqeberha) 3rd T20I: November 13 (Centurion) 4th T20I: November 15 (Johannesburg).
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