Shubman Gill-led India arrive in Sri Lanka for Test series

Sri Lanka Cricket have shared photos of Team India arriving in Colombo ahead of their two-Test series.

Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal and KL Rahul in the photos released by Sri Lanka Cricket. (SLC Photo)Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal and KL Rahul in the photos released by Sri Lanka Cricket. (SLC Photo)

Team India have arrived in Sri Lanka ahead of their two-match Test series in the country, with the country’s cricket board sharing images of the players on its social media handle. However, they are without top-order batsman Sai Sudharsan, who is racing against time to be fit and is continuing his rehabilitation at the BCCI Centre of Excellence in Bengaluru.

“Team India have arrived in Sri Lanka ahead of the upcoming Test series! The stage is set for an exciting battle between two cricketing nations,” said Sri Lanka Cricket in its post on X on Tuesday.

The first Test starts on August 15 and will be played in Galle. The second will be played at the Sinhalese Sports Club in Colombo. Before that, though, India will be play a three-day warm-up match which starts on August 7 at the Nondescripts Cricket Club groung in Colombo.

This will be the first Test series that India play in Sri Lanka in over a decade. They had won the last one 3-0 in 2017. Then led by Virat Kohli, India were dominant throughout, winning the first Test by 304 runs, the second by an innings and 53 runs and the third by an innings and 171 runs. It is also the first time that India and Sri Lanka are playing a Test series since March 2022, which India had won 2-0.

India go into the series without ace pacer Jasprit Bumrah, whose knee injury during the second ODI against England last month is far from attaining full fitness. When the BCCI released the squad for the two-match Test series, Bumrah’s inclusion was subject to him clearing fitness test.

With nearly four-week break before the first Test, India were hoping that Bumrah would regain full fitness by then and were keen to take him on board even if is unlikely to feature in the warm-up fixture. However, during the rehab process, Bumrah is understood to have felt discomfort in his knee and as a result his comeback is expected to take time. India have replaced him with Auqib Nabi, whose exploits played a huge role in Jammu and Kashmir winning their first Ranji Trophy title earlier this year.

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