Australia win toss, elect to bat in 2nd Test

Australia won the toss and elected to bat in the second Test match against India at the Melbourne Cricket Ground here on Saturday.

Melbourne: The Aussies, who defeated India by eight wickets in the first Test in Adelaide after bowling them out for a paltry 36 in the second innings, have fielded an unchanged squad.

India, meanwhile, are going in with four changes. They have brought in Shubman Gill, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Siraj and Rishabh Pant in place of Prithvi Shaw (dropped), Virat Kohli (personal reasons), Mohammed Shami (injured) and Wriddhiman Saha (dropped).

Ajinkya Rahane will lead the side in the absence of Kohli, who has returned to India to attend the birth of his child.

Gill and Siraj are making their Test debut making this the first instance since November, 2013 when India have fielded two debutants in a match. In that 2013 Kolkata Test vs West Indies, India played Rohit Sharma and Mohammed Shami.

This is the 100th Test between India and Australia.

Teams:

India (Playing XI): Mayank Agarwal, Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane(c), Hanuma Vihari, Rishabh Pant(w), Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin, Umesh Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj

Australia (Playing XI): Matthew Wade, Joe Burns, Marnus Labuschagne, Steven Smith, Travis Head, Cameron Green, Tim Paine(w/c), Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Nathan Lyon, Josh Hazlewood