Shubman Gill and Sai Sudharsan to miss India A’s second unofficial Test against England Lions

‌India’s new Test captain Shubman Gill and Sai Sudharsan are set to miss India A’s second unofficial Test against England Lions which is scheduled to start in Northampton on June 6. The BCCI had earlier decided that the Gujarat Titans duo would travel to England after their IPL stint to join the A side to get some crucial red-ball time before the start of the marquee five-match series against England. But now they will travel with the rest of the squad which will land in England on Friday, the day one of the unofficial Test match.

However, veteran batter KL Rahul, who is also part of the 18-member side for the England Tests, is expected to join the India A squad on Tuesday and will be part of the team for the second match. Along with Rahul, pacer Akash Deep is also expected to get some game time with India A ahead of the marathon series after returning from a back injury during the IPL. He was in Canterbury during the first game as well but just trained with the side and was not part of the eleven.

Karun Nair, Dhruv Jurel, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shardul Thakur, Nitish Kumar Reddy and Abhimanyu Easwaran, who are also part of the Indian team, played the first unofficial game which ended in a draw. Karun scored a double hundred in the first innings while Jurel had two fifties in two innings. Jaiswal, Nitish and Easwaran scored half-centuries in the second innings of the game which saw both sides scoring more than 500 in their respective first innings.

The other members of the Indian team are expected to land on Friday with an intra-squad game against India A set to happen behind closed doors in Beckenham from June 13. The side, after the four-day game, will then travel to Leeds for the first Test slated to begin on June 20.