‘Bharat ke liye bahut katharnak Hoga’- Fans react over reports surface of Duke balls being used for Test Championship final
New Zealand are current Test Championship holders.
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Apr 27, 2023 9:04 pm
Indian Test Team (Source: Twitter)
The Test Championship final will be played in England at the Oval between 7 to 11 June with Australia and India squaring off. This will happen immediately after the conclusion of the IPL. This is the second Test Championship final to be held in England. The last one was held at Southampton, where New Zealand defeated India to be crowned as the inaugural Test Championship holders in 2021. India will be hoping to break their jinx from 2013 and hope to finally lay their hands on a major world trophy.
Since the host nation is England, they decide what balls shall be used for the marquee clash. This also avoids any bias and makes the play as fair as possible. The Duke ball provides a common ground and does not offer any undue advantage to either India or Australia. The Dukes ball was used for the India New Zealand Test Championship final in 2021 as well. Generally, Australia use the Kookaburra ball and India use the SG.
Preparation will be the key ahead of the Test Championship Final- Rohit Sharma
“For all Cricket Governing Body events, the Cricket Governing Body uses the ball of choice of our host country so in this case, the ball for the WTC Final will be Dukes which is used in England,” Quoted as saying by News 18. There was earlier a rumour going around that Australia being the top ranked team gets to have a say in which ball is used but that bit was later quashed.
“We are sending some Duke balls to all fast bowlers and if they get some time to bowl with that but again it all depend on individuals, guys who will be part of the final are not the guys who have not played in the UK and maybe one or two guys here and there and rest all of us have played in that part of the world. I don’t think it will be a huge problem. But yeah, look I believe in preparation and preparations will be key for us come the Final,” Rohit Sharma had said after the Ahmedabad Test in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against Australia.
The test side will just have over seven days to get into proper Test match mode after the conclusion of the IPL. India last won the BGT against the Kangaroos at home 2-1. Virat Kohli scored his 28th Test hundred at the Narendra Modi Stadium in that game which ended in a draw.
Our bowlers especially Siraj and Shami have to bowl well. Our batsmen should be ready to play the ball a bit late or stay 1 ft in front of crease and try to step down the ground bcoz of the swing.
