Shubman Gill has continued his purple patch in 2023 with his fifth century across formats. Gill got his second Test hundred from 194 balls with a boundary off Todd Murphy on March 11 at Narendra Modi Cricket Stadium, Ahmedabad.
Gill became the 14th Indian opener to score a Test century against Australia. He is also the fourth batter to score a century in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy. He is also the second-youngest Indian opener to score a Test century against Australia after VVS Laxman.
In reply to Australia's 480, the 23-year-old shared a 74-run opening stand with Rohit Sharma who got dismissed for 35 by left-arm spinner Matthew Kuhnemann. He shared a 113-run partnership for the second wicket with Cheteshwar Pujara who got dismissed by Todd Murphy after scoring 42 runs.
Gill's first Test century came against Bangladesh in December 2022. He scored110 in the second innings of Chattogram Test in the absence of an injured Rohit. As Rohit regained fitness, Gill had to warm the benches despite KL Rahul struggling to score. After Rahul registered a string of low scores and failed to cross the 25-run mark in 10 Test innings on the trot, the widespread criticism led to him getting dropped.
Gill was picked for the Indore Test. However, on a rank turner which assisted spinners from the first session, Gill registered scores of 21 and 5 in the third Test which India lost by nine wickets.
Gill has become joint-third on the list of Indian batters with most Test centuries at the age of 23. Legendary Sachin Tendulkar had scored 22 centuries by then whereas Virat Kohli had registered 15. Also, former head coach Ravi Shastri had seven centuries to his name at the age of 23.
“It feels great to score a hundred here. This is my IPL home ground and glad to get some runs here. The pitch was pretty good to bat on. Anything happening off the pitch was off the rough area. I was looking to pick singles whenever possible. Honestly, I was still trying to be positive and was keep looking for singles. They weren't attacking that much. We are three down for almost 300. We would look to get a big score on day 4. Who knows the wicket might help our bowlers on Day 5,” Gill said after the day's play.
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