5 selection blunders that cost India in Test cricket in 2018

#4 Dropping Cheteshwar Pujara in the first Test in England

Cheteshwar Pujara

Cheteshwar Pujara is one of India’s premier Test players. He has played four seasons of County cricket and even this year, before the England tour when most of the other Indians were involved in the IPL, he was busy playing County cricket for Yorkshire.

However, he was dropped from the XI in the first Test at Edgbaston. He hadn’t scored a lot of runs in County cricket and wasn’t in the best of forms but his experience of playing multiple seasons in England would’ve been very handy. India opted to play all three openers – Murali Vijay, Shikhar Dhawan and KL Rahul who batted at No. 3.

All three batsmen failed in both innings and India failed to chase down 194 in the fourth innings with only Virat Kohli doing the bulk of the scoring (in both innings). It’s not that Pujara’s presence would’ve changed the result but his calming influence does help in a tricky run-chase.