Hyderabad: 

Ravindra Jadeja can be in line to retire from red-ball cricket as he is 36-year-old while considering the fact that Mohammed Shami is aged 34 and the workload of a fast bowler is very heavy, he might also be next in line.

A new era has arrived in Indian Test cricket as two senior players Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli have stepped away from the game. Earlier, Indian off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin also announced his retirement during the Border Gavaskar Trophy in Australia. These bunch of senior players quit Test cricket and there might be some more names in the list in the future.

Thus, India are facing a transition period and that will require the team to find the talent to replace them in the batting unit. While Kohli boasted an average of 46.85 in Test cricket, Rohit has an average of 40.57.

Need to form new top 4:

Although the opening slot is vacant, India already have three openers in the form of Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal and KL Rahul. The probability of Gill and Jaiswal opening the innings is more and KL Rahul might bat in the lower order. In such cases, the team will have to find batters for No.3 and No.4.

Thus, the team will have to look at the domestic circuit to get replacements.

With the departure of Rohit and Kohli from the Indian Test setup, the team will have to find a new top four for the upcoming tours. Both the batters used to give stability to the top order and so the Indian team will need to either groom young talent or replace the already established batters.

Players who can be potential replacements?

Sai Sudharsan is the most prominent name emerging who can feature in the middle order of the Indian batting unit. The left-handed batter showed immense consistency in the IPL 2025 which was revised recently. Sudharsan has a first-class average of 39.93 from 29 matches with a tally of 1957 runs including seven centuries.

The other name who has shone with his performance in the domestic circuit is Karun Nair. The right-handed batter has 8211 runs to his name from 114 matches with an average of 49.16 including 23 centuries. Also, he had a decent domestic season scoring 779 runs from eight innings with a massive average of 389.50 and a strike rate of 124.04.

Shreyas Iyer is another strong contender and he has shown a brilliant domestic form with the bat. He has been one of the most improved Indian batters in the recent times after working on his vulnerability against short deliveries. He has amassed 811 runs with an average of 36.86 including one century. The 30-year-old can slot in at No.4 in the Indian batting unit.

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