'No Gill no win' - Fans slam management as Shubman Gill gets snubbed for 1st Test vs Australia

IND vs AUS 2023: 'No Gill no win' - Fans slam management as Shubman Gill gets snubbed for 1st Test vs Australia (Image Source: Twitter)

India and Australia are facing off in the first Test of the three-match series that got underway on February 9, Thursday and it was Pat Cummins who called it right at the toss. To add more, the Australians chose to bat first in view of putting runs on the board and putting the Indian team on the back foot early on in the game. 

That being said, one of the shocking exclusions from the playing XI for team India was the exclusion of star Indian batter Shubman Gill. To add more, to the surprise of the Indian fans, Suryakumar Yadav was included as Number 5 while there were speculations that it might be Gill at the batting order or KL Rahul if Gill is tasked to open the innings. 

However, none of the ideas worked and it was the specialist batter instead who made a cut to the playing XI. Rohit Sharma, the Indian skipper, looked confident about the win although the Baggy Greens came up with a pretty strong squad for the game and it would all depend on how the first day goes for both teams. 

We would have batted too: Rohit Sharma

Rohit said at the toss that they would have batted first as well, given that the pitch looked dry on the day. It remains to be seen if the Nagpur surface would play out to be well as the odds for the pitch to turn out to be a bad one are too high, according to the Australians and their media. The Indian team, on the other hand, would look to restrict their opponents to a lower total and prove a point. 

“We would have batted too. Looks pretty dry. There will be help for spinners. We got to wait and see how much it does. Yesterday when we started training we did see some seam movement for the pacers up front. We have had a good prep for the last 5-6 days,” Rohit was quoted as saying at the toss. 

“We trained on the aspects in store. This is a big one. We know the importance of the series but we also understand it's about winning one session at a time. It's a long series. Three spinners, two seamers,” said the Indian captain further. 

Here’s how the fans have reacted to Shubman Gill’s exclusion from the playing XI for the Nagpur Test: 

No sense of SKY over Gill… This is proper biasing

— Ishiraj (@Ishiraj1) February 9, 2023

Why kela rahul over gill, hope india lose this series 🤬

— Harshal Lahane (@HarshalLahane1) February 9, 2023

Gill not playing is laughable.#INDvsAUS #BGT2023

— Mr. Tweet Jr. (@ikprav) February 9, 2023

It's baffling how much opportunities Rahul gets....

— Amarjeet Singh (@amarjeet015) February 9, 2023

Overcompensating for @RishabhPant17 by playing @surya_14kumar and Why is @klrahul playing ?

— Abhilash Pradhan (@AB_Prad) February 9, 2023

Gill robbed

— Darsh Patel (@darsh_patel462) February 9, 2023

The man who hit 5 hundreds in his last 12 matches.... including all formats couldn't found the place in team....

Welcome to India

— 𝙱𝚎𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝙰𝚔𝚜𝚑𝚊𝚢 (@Akshay_P23) February 9, 2023

With the kind of Form Shubman Gill is having,not to pick him is INDIA'S LOSS CERTAINLY.

— 🇮🇳Advocate Drishti Thakkar🇮🇳 (@Populardrishti) February 9, 2023

All Good, Except Gill

— khushanshu (@no1khush) February 9, 2023

No Gill No win

— 𝙍𝘼𝙎𝙃𝙄𝘿 (@rashidsarwar29) February 9, 2023