Shubman Gill replaces star India batter in the second Test against New Zealand

Star India batter Shubman Gill returned to India's playing XI in the second Test against New Zealand as the visitors won the toss and opted to bat in Pune on Thursday. Team India made three big changes after facing an eight-wicket defeat in the first Test in Bengaluru last week. However, Gill missed the first Test match in Bengaluru due to a stiff neck but Team India head coach Gautam Gambhir confirmed before the second Test that Gill has recovered completely.

Shubman Gill replaced KL Rahul

However, Shubman Gill replaced out-of-form batter KL Rahul, while India also dropped the speedster, Mohammed Siraj and Kuldeep Yadav, respectively. Akash Deep and Washington Sundar replaced Kuldeep and Siraj in the playing XI for the match as well.

Meanwhile, New Zealand made one change to their playing XI as they added left-arm spinner Mitchell Santer in place of injured pacer Matt Henry as well. India captain Rohit Sharma also admitted that he would've loved to bat first in Pune.

"I would have batted as well . Whatever the pitch is we have to play good cricket. Lot of positives. No matter what the situation of the game is, you always try and come back into the game. That is what we did. At the end, not a lot of runs on the board. A little drier [the pitch]. We do understand how important the first 10-15 overs. We have made three changes," Rohit Sharma said at the toss.

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Matt Henry misses out with a glute niggle

"We're going to have a bat. Surface slightly different to what it was last week. Not a lot of grass. Might produce a bit of spin as we expect when we come to these parts of the world. Obviously a really proud moment for this group. We celebrated that but our focus has quickly turned to Pune here. It's just about adapting to this surface. Trying to take the confidence we built up from last week. Matt Henry misses out with a glute niggle. Santner comes in," the New Zealand captain, Tom Latham said.

India XI: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rohit Sharma (C), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Rishabh Pant (wk), Sarfaraz Khan, Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, Ravichandran Ashwin, Akash Deep, Jasprit Bumrah

New Zealand XI: Tom Latham (C), Devon Conway, Will Young, Rachin Ravindra, Daryl Mitchell, Tom Blundell (wk), Glenn Phillips, Tim Southee, Mitchell Santner, Ajaz Patel, William O'Rourke