Pant says Gill will bat at No. 4, India yet to decide No. 3 option

India's vice-captain Rishabh Pant has confirmed Shubman Gill will take the No. 4 position vacated by former captain and India's fourth-highest run-getter in Test cricket, Virat Kohli. Pant said India are still deliberating over who will move to No. 3, the slot last occupied by Gill, who is the new captain after Rohit Sharma's retirement.

The options for No. 3 seem to be the returning Karun Nair and the uncapped B Sai Sudharsan, who is rated highly by experts. There might be room for both of them in the XI as India need to slot in another specialist batter after Pant at No. 5.

At the moment, two days before the Test and with one training session to go, Nair looks like the favourite to take on the responsibility of batting against the new ball at No. 3. He batted at No. 3 for India against India A in the practice match they played behind closed doors. He was also at first slip in India's slip catching practice, with KL Rahul, Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal making up the rest of the cordon in that order.

Jaiswal and Rahul are set to reunite at the top after starting and ending the series in Australia as opening partners with Rohit taking back his place in the middle of the series. If Nair is indeed the No. 3, and given Ravindra Jadeja's near certainty as the allrounder, that one remaining batting position could go to either Sudharsan or Nitish Kumar Reddy, who scored a century in Australia.

The more important deliberations will be around the bowlers. Playing Reddy or Washington Sundar as the fifth bowler. The reluctance to pick a fifth bowler in Australia came under criticism as it was a departure from the successful Indian teams of the last six years, who prioritised taking 20 wickets over batting depth.

The presence of Shardul Thakur, who can bat at No. 8 and give India some batting depth, could give India a fourth somewhat genuine seam-bowling option, but it wasn't yet clear Thakur would be preferred to Reddy. The duo bowled long spells in India's first training session at Headingley.

Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj were all but certain to lead the pace attack. India called up Harshit Rana for this Test as cover for possible niggles to Siraj and Akash Deep, but both of them turned up fine and were fit to go. Akash, though, wasn't a certainty as Prasidh Krishna's high release and disconcerting bounce could be a point of difference India might be looking for. Unless they feel the unusually warm Headingley weather will turn over the weekend. In that case, Kuldeep Yadav could become a factor unless they choose the option of batting depth and go with Washington.