Ajinkya Rahane has been in a spectacular form for Chennai Super Kings in the ongoing IPL. He scored an unbeaten 71 against Kolkata Knight Riders last week. 
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Ajinkya Rahane has been in a spectacular form for Chennai Super Kings in the ongoing IPL. He scored an unbeaten 71 against Kolkata Knight Riders last week. Batter Ajinkya Rahane has been included in the Team India for the World Test Championship final against Australia following his spectacular performance in the ongoing Indian Premier League. Rahane, who has played around 82 Test matches, was not in the team for 15 months due to his poor form. He played his last Test match in January 2022 in the South Africa Test series.
In this IPL season so far, Rahane, who is playing for Chennai Super Kings (CSK), has scored 209 runs at an average of 52.25. His strike rate is 199.04. He sits third in the list of top-scorers in the league at present. Rahane scored an unbeaten 71 against Kolkata Knight Riders last week. Earlier, Rahane smashed the fastest 50 runs in 19 deliveries in the 12th match against Mumbai Indians (MI) at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai.
Rahane, who was struggling with his poor form, was with KKR in IPL 2022 and got limited opportunity to play under the leadership of Shreyas Iyer. He played just 7 matches and scored just 133 runs at a strike rate of under 104. Before that, he was with Rajasthan Royals and Delhi Capitals.
This year, the 34-year-old batter was bought by CSK at his base price of Rs 50 lakh. CSK was the only team to bid for Rahane. In just five matches this IPL season, Rahane has clocked 209 runs at an unbelievable strike rate of 199.05, which is the best since Andre Russell's strike rate of 204.81 for KKR in IPL 2019.
This is not the first time that Rahane has stunned viewers with his brilliant performance. In the 2015 edition of the league, he became the second-leading run-getter with 540 runs in 14 matches at a strike rate of 130.75.
On the other hand, Rahane, who was previously in the Grade B category in BCCI's central contracts list, was not given a contract in the current cycle. Rahane last played T20 Internationals way back in 2016, while he has not played an ODI since 2018.
The Test match selection and his stellar performance in IPL 2023 may open the window for a comeback in the white-ball format.
India Test squad
Besides Rahane, KL Rahul will also make a comeback after he was dropped from the last two Tests of the Australia series. All-rounder Shardul Thakur has also been included in the squad.
Suryakumar Yadav, on the other hand, has not been included in the squad. Besides him, Kuldeep Yadav, Ishan Kishan, Jasprit Bumrah and Shreyas Iyer have been dropped from the team lineup. Bumrah and Iyer were dropped from the squad as both are recovering from back injuries.
The summit clash between India and Australia will be held from June 07 to June 11 at the Oval in London. In the recent four-match Border-Gavaskar Test series between India and Australia, which was held in India, Team India secured a 2-1 win.
India squad for WTC final against Australia: Rohit Sharma (Captain), Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, K L Rahul, KS Bharat (wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Shardul Thakur, Mohd. Shami, Mohd. Siraj, Umesh Yadav, Jaydev Unadkat.
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