India win toss, elect to bat vs Bangladesh in one-off Test at Hyderabad

Hosts and No. 1 Test side in the world India won the coin toss, and elected to bat first against visitors and neighbours Bangladesh, in the one-off Test at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad on Thursday. Indian skipper Virat Kohli made the decision citing the reason that the Hyderabad wicket is always a good track to bat on initially. He decided to play five bowlers in the side, while Karun Nair misses out. Meanwhile, Bangladesh skipper Mushfiqur Rahim moved in with a balanced squad, with a couple of pacers, and a couple of spinners, while they field seven batsmen in the side. With the first-ever Test match played between the both nations in India, it is all expected to be a cracker of a contest, regardless of the outcome. FULL CRICKET UPDATES: India vs Bangladesh, One-off Test at Hyderabad

During the toss, Kohli said, “We would like to bat first. Hyderabad has always been a good batting wicket. It is hard and the fast bowlers do get some help out here. For us the opposition is not something we focus on, we focus on executing our skills and we would like to go ahead with the same mindset. We are playing with five bowlers and unfortunately Karun misses out.” India vs Bangladesh, One-off Test at Hyderabad, Preview

Add Cricket Country as a Preferred Source

While Rahim said, “A great moment for Bangladesh cricket and hopefully we would put up a good performance against the number one team in the world. We learnt a couple of things from the last match, a couple of mistakes cost us the game against NZ. We have to keep our momentum up for all five days and we learnt some key lessons out there. The wicket would be pretty good for the first two days and the spinners will come in later. We are going in with two quicks, two spinners and seven batsmen.”

Teams:

India: Murali Vijay, Lokesh Rahul, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli (c), Ajinkya Rahane, Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Umesh Yadav, Ishant Sharma.