India vs Sri Lanka: Meet Vijay Shankar, the latest entry to India's Test squad

Feb 19: India captain Virat Kohli on Wednesday dropped enough hints to indicate that seniormost pacer Ishant Sharma and young opener Prithvi Shaw will be in the playing XI for the first Test against New Zealand in Wellington. If India's net session on Wednesday is taken into consideration, Wriddhiman Saha is starting as the wicketkeeper ahead of Rishabh Pant for the series opener beginning on Friday. Hanuma Vihari, the team's designated No 6 batsman for away Tests, will be the fifth bowling option with Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami and Ishant being three specialist pacers.

Ravichandran Ashwin is in the mix for the lone specialist spinner's spot though Ravindra Jadeja's all-round skills can't be ignored either.

Ishant, who was out for three weeks with an ankle injury sustained during a Ranji Trophy game, bowled full tilt at the nets and even earned appreciation for troubling batsmen with his pace and bounce.

"He (Ishant) looked pretty normal and pretty similar to what he was bowling before the ankle injury. He is hitting good areas again and he has played (Test cricket) in New Zealand couple of times, so his experience will be useful to us. It was really good to see him bowling with pace and in good areas," Kohli said during his media interaction.

The skipper also said in as many words that the team wouldn't like to change Shaw's natural stroke-play which was a good enough hint that Shubman Gill will have to warm the benches for now.

"Prithvi is a talented player and he has his own game and we want him to follow his instincts and play the way he does. Look, these guys have no baggage and are not desperate to perform in any manner," the skipper said.

The skipper wants Shaw to take a leaf out of Mayank Agarwal's performance in Australia back in 2018-19 when he hit back to back half-centuries in Melbourne and Sydney.

"They don't have any nerves to do well overseas. Like a clear head with which Mayank played in Australia, Prithvi can do the same in New Zealand.

"A bunch of guys playing with fearlessness, something that can motivate the whole team, gives us start that the team wants and not get intimidated by the opposition in any way."

The skipper downplayed India's below-par show in the three-match ODI series, especially that of Agarwal.

"Prithvi, I think you can call him relatively inexperienced and Mayank, I wouldn't call him that inexperienced because he has scored a lot of runs last year. So he understands what his game is like in Test cricket.

"I think sometimes in white ball cricket we try to do too much but once you come into red ball cricket, you fall into that disciplined mode of batting, which obviously suits him much more at this stage."

While he didn't give an answer on the Saha-Pant debate, the burly Delhi keeper had precious little to do at the main nets and was seen spending more time doing his keeping drills and only got an opportunity to bat when the first team completed its routines.

New Zealand are likely to go with an all-pace attack but the Indian captain wants to stick to his team's strengths which is play with one spinner in the four-pronged bowling attack.

"If it had been a Johannesburg pitch, I could have said it's a possibility (to play four pacers) but our team has that skill that we can bowl out other teams with only three fast bowlers," he sounded confident.

"But you need one world class skillful spinner, who can take wickets on any pitch. We won't copy the home team. We would rather figure out what is the most lethal combination, which gives us balance," he added.

"As a bowling group it's better than the one that came to NZ last time and that is why we have got so many teams all out in last two and half years. We would like to repeat that here also," Kohli added.

New Delhi, May 30: Former world chess champion Viswanathan Anand will be finally reaching India late on Saturday after being stuck in Germany for over three months due to the travel restrictions imposed in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Yes.. Anand will be returning today," the chess maestro's wife Aruna told PTI on Saturday morning. Anand, who boarded an Air India flight (AI-120) from Frankfurt on Friday night will reach Bengaluru via Delhi.

He is expected to reach Bengaluru at 1.15 pm. The five-time world champion will undergo 14 days quarantine as per rules laid down by the Karnataka government.

"He will complete quarantine procedures and come to Chennai as per protocol," Aruna Anand said. The flights from Germany are only scheduled to land only in Delhi and Bengaluru.

The chess ace was in Germany to play in the Bundesliga chess league and was to return to India, but was forced to stay put after the COVID-19 outbreak disrupted sporting schedules across the globe, apart from restricting movement.

He was staying near Frankfurt and was doing online commentary for the Candidates tournament which was called off mid-way due to the pandemic and led the Indian team in the Online Nations Cup early this month.

Anand had been in touch with his family in Chennai on a regular basis via video calls and kept himself busy with chess-related work.

New Delhi, Feb 20: Grappler Divya Kakran on Thursday became the second Indian woman to win a gold medal at the ongoing Asian Wrestling Championship.

Divya, a bronze medallist at Asian Games 2018, earned her first gold by winning all her four bouts against Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Uzbekistan and Japan.

Her final bout against Naruha Matsuyuki of Japan was the closest one but she managed to outclass her opponent 6-4 to seal her name on the gold medal. The 68 kg category was played in round-robin format as only five wrestlers were in the fray.

India is likely to add some more medals to its tally when Nirmala Devi, Pinki, and Sarita go out to grapple for the yellow metal in their respective weight categories.

Three-time Commonwealth championship gold medallist, Nirmala Devi (50 kg) first defeated Munkhnar Byambasuren of Mongolia in the quarterfinals by 6-4 to reach the semis.

In the semi-finals, Nirmala got the better of Dauletbike Yakhshimuratova of Uzbekistan by 10-0 and will play against 2018 Under-23 World Champion Miho Igarashi of Japan for the gold medal.

Pinki (55 kg) started her day on a winning note against Shokhida Akhmedova of Uzbekistan by 12-4 in round 3 and lost to Kana Higashikawa of Japan to enter the semis where she defeated Marina Zuyeva of Kazakistan by a score of 6-0.

Pinki will play in the gold medal bout against Dulguun Bolormaa of Mongolia.

Sarita (59 kg) will now face Battsetseg Altantsetseg of Mongolia in the gold medal bout after winning against her opponents in the qualifiers, quarterfinals and semi-final by a score of 10-0, 11-0 and 10-3, respectively.