Indian opening batsman Rohit Sharma on Tuesday said that the pink-ball Day-Night Test between India and Australia later this year will be a challenge. Team India will play their first-ever away D-N Test during the tour to Down Under which will have a total of four Tests.
Rohit was having a Q&A session on Instagram when a fan asked, “How prepared are you to play pink ball test match in aus. Because you haven’t opened. Ur mindset?”
To which Rohit replied, “Will be challenging for sure.”
India are all set to have a long tour of Australia which is scheduled to have the ICC T20 World Cup, a three-match T20I series and the four Test.
However, the fate of the T20 World Cup has been shaken due to the global crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Rumours have suggested that it might get postponed to 2022.
A BCCI official, meanwhile, has also claimed that the three-match T20I series between India and Australia have come under doubts after Cricket Australia (CA) chairman Earl Eddings stated that hosting the ICC T20 World Cup later this year would be “unrealistic” and “very very difficult”.
Virat Kohli & boys are scheduled to play three T20Is against the Kangaroos in Down Under on October 11, 14 and 17 before the T20 World Cup is supposed to take place between October 18 and November 15.
“If the T20 World Cup is scrapped, as it increasingly looks as if it will, then travelling to Australia in October would not be practical and we can visit them post the IPL, if the IPL season indeed happens during that period,” the official said.
The Test series, though, looks settled as both the parties – Cricket Australia and BCCI – have mutually agreed to the schedule that has been released.
Gabba would host the opening match from December 3. While the second match in Adelaide from December 11 will be India’s first away Day-Night Test, the ones in Melbourne and Sydney will be the traditional Boxing Day and New Year Tests respectively.