The former Indian opener Aakash Chopra doesn’t think that India will be one of the two teams which will be qualifying for the World Test Championship (WTC) final. India had qualified for the final of the previous championship, before losing to New Zealand, but this time around, it seems unlikely.
India has already lost 3 test matches in the current WTC cycle, one to England and two to South Africa, and if they have to make it to the final from here, they will have to win almost every single match.
India has to complete the ongoing test series against Sri Lanka, play a test series against Bangladesh, take part in the postponed 5th test match of the series against England and then play the Border Gavaskar trophy against Australia.
Australia is a strong contender for the World Test Championship final: Aakash Chopra
In the view of Aakash Chopra, the challenge that Australia and Pakistan have in front of them in terms of the opponents that they have to face and the no. of points that they have to accumulate, it appears as if they have a slightly easier challenge as compared to India.
According to Aakash, if Australia and Pakistan don’t falter massively, those two teams have higher chances of making it to the World Test Championship final than India.
Analyzing the current WTC standings on his YouTube channel, Aakash said if India had not lost the test series against South Africa in South Africa, they would have been placed in a much better situation in the WTC table at this point of time. But, that loss hurt India’s chances.
Aakash doesn’t think New Zealand, another finalist of the previous WTC, will finish in the top 2 either. The 44-year old reckons if any team can emerge as a dark horse to qualify to the WTC final, apart from Australia and Pakistan, it’s South Africa because of their recent form.
