Rishabh Pant ready for debut at Trent Bridge?

Handing over the maiden test cap to Rishabh Pant is on the cards in the third test match at Trent Bridge after India's primary wicketkeeper-batsman for this series, Dinesh Karthik failed miserly with the bat in the first two test matches at Edgbaston and Lord's respectively.

Moreover, Karthik, who kept the wickets in the first two matches was seen feeding balls to Pant during the wicketkeeping drills before the start of the third test which gives a hint of Rishabh Pant playing ahead of Karthik.

But it would be uncertain that if Karthik will miss the match, it would be because of his poor batting performances or any injury. As Karthik was seen suffering from a lot of pain in the last match when he collected a wide delivery off Hardik Pandya. He later was attended by the Indian physio Patrick Farhart at the end of that over and got his fingers taped. Though, he was later seen in the nets practicing after that, indicating that he is fit.

Coming to Karthik's performance in this series so far, not only his batting was below average where he scored just 21 runs in four innings which included two ducks but his wicketkeeping also looked quite average. This is maybe because of the fact that he is not a regular wicketkeeper in domestic cricket and plays now just a specialist batsman.

On being asked about Pant's selection in the third test match, Indian head coach Ravi Shastri said that you will get to see that at 11, before the match.

Pant has already represented India in four T20Is but is yet to play the One Day Internationals or test matches. He was also part of the two first-class matches that India played on this tour where he scored 189 runs at an average of 63 which included three half-centuries.

It seems to be the perfect time to start looking ahead and invest in young talents like Rishabh Pant in red ball cricket, keeping in mind the form that he possesses right now.