IND Vs ENG: India's new number three batter has finally amassed a century at that crucial batting position. Shubman Gill, who didn’t even get past fifty in the last 10 innings of a red ball match at his new number position, has scored a majestic hundred in the second ongoing Test match in Visakhapatnam. The Prince scored 104 runs in the second innings of the 2nd red ball game of this five match series.
Gill also survived a few close as well before he got to his maiden three-figure mark at the number 3 batting position. Since last year, Shubman has started batting at number 3 in the Test format. We saw Gill at that number for the first time on the tour of West Indies.
But despite his failures, India kept backing him at that number and finally Gill had repaid that faith yesterday with a wonderful knock.
India wanted an aggressive opener in the red ball format as well along with Rohit Sharma. So Yashaswi Jaiswal was given an opportunity and Gill was pushed to the number 3 spot.
Jaiswal grabbed that chance with both hands as he smashed a century on his first ever red ball match which he played against West Indies on that tour of the Caribbean in 2023.
Jaiswal had even scored his first double-hundred in the first innings of this second ongoing Test match against England in Vizag.
He was the one who held the innings together with a sublime knock of 209 runs when none of the other Indian batters even scored a fifty in that innings and because of Yashaswi, the Men in Blue were able to post a score of 396 runs in their 1st innings.
India’s former number three batter in the red ball format was Cheteshwar Pujara. But his form in the red ball format as a specialist batter wasn’t that great.
Pujara was the last batter to slam a century at that batting position of number three in the Test matches played at home in India. He achieved this feat in 2017 and Gill broke that record yesterday with a century after 7 years.
Gill also has slammed 3 centuries in the World Test Championship tournament so far. Rohit Sharma has the most tons in this red ball event of the ICC.
Hitman has scored 7 of them and the King, Virat Kohli, who might be back for the 3rd Test match in Rajkot has scored 4 centuries in the red ball format during this Test tournament.
The other Indian players who scored centuries in WTC are Mayank Agarwal who has also scored 4 Test tons in the WTC alongside, Ajinkya Rahane, Rishabh Pant, and Kannur Lokesh Rahul are the other batters who have also scored 3 tons in the red ball match tournament so far.
Yesterday, Gill smashed his 3rd ton of his red ball format career.