After suffering defeats in South Africa and England, BCCI is taking the upcoming tour of Australia extremely seriously and is contemplating sending the Test specialists with the India A squad to New Zealand to get acclimatised to the conditions.

Lack of practice matches proved very costly in South Africa and England and the board wants to give the players as much practice as possible before the Tests in Australia.

Conditions in Australia could suit Rohit Sharma

Rohit Sharma
File photo of Rohit SharmaISHARA S. KODIKARA/AFP/Getty Images

Also, if reports in Mumbai Mirror is to be believed, the selectors and captain Virat Kohli and coach Ravi Shastri want to take Rohit Sharma to Australia as according to them, the conditions down under could suit his batting.

While Rohit has struggled against the seaming ball, he has the game to be successful on pacy and bouncy tracks and has the ability to tackle fast-bowling.

After leading India to the title in the just-concluded Asia Cup, Rohit found support from current and former cricketers as they backed him to be included in the Test team for West Indies. However, the selectors went for young faces in Prithvi Shaw, Mayank Agarwal, and Mohammed Siraj. Also, there is Hanuma Vihari in the squad.

Out-of-favour Indian cricket team spinner Harbhajan Singh was extremely critical of the selections and took to Twitter to express his displeasure. He wrote: "No @ImRo45 in test team against West Indies..what r the selectors thinking actually??? Anyone have a clue ??? plz let me know as I can't digest this."

Former Indian captain Sourav Ganguly also expressed his surprise over the exclusion of Rohit from the Test squad.

If the Indian management does prefer Rohit in Australia, it would be interesting to see which batsman he replaces in the side. Both Mayank Agarwal and Prithvi Shaw have been in irresistible form in the recent past while Hanuma Vihari has plundered runs for fun over the last 15 months.