Centurion, Dec 24 (IANS): On this tour of South Africa, there is a feeling of newness in the Indian Test batting line-up. Though Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma are in the mix, India are without senior batters Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane in South Africa.

Tuesday’s series opener at the SuperSport Park is going to be the first game since the Adelaide Test against Australia in 2012 where an Indian Test playing eleven will be without both Rahane and Pujara. In their place, it’s a chance for Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shubman Gill, along with a returning KL Rahul to keep themselves in the long-term Test team picture.

With Jaiswal and Gill of attacking ilk, head coach Rahul Dravid thinks the team will encourage the young batters to be themselves with the bat. At the same time, he also expects them to keep the cricketing smarts and conditions in mind during any point in the match.

"We encourage the players to play the way they feel most comfortable in. In the end, you are judged by the results you produce. The guys know that, they understand that. We want to encourage them to play in the way that they play.”

“But also keeping in view the conditions and keeping certain sort of tactical things that you have to be aware of when you play in South Africa. The nature of the ball and how that behaves over the course of 80 overs and the kind of shots you can play may be in the early part of innings vis-a-vis what you might be able to do later on."

"I think there's a balance between finding that, just having the cricket smarts and to read a game, understand the situation and play according to it. But of course, allowing yourself to express yourself. So certainly, we've got guys who do play their shots and we are not going to hold them back, and we are going to allow them to express themselves, and hopefully they'll make some smart decisions when the situation arrives," said Dravid in the pre-series press conference.

The weather forecast for first two days of Centurion Test predicts rain, which further intensifies the bowling combination debate. With Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj being certainties, there will be a toss-up between Mukesh Kumar and Prasidh Krishna for third pacer’s slot.

Moreover, questions are also on Ravindra Jadeja and Ravichandran Ashwin being fielded together or would one of them make way for a seam-bowling all-rounder in Shardul Thakur. But Dravid chose to not drop any serious hints on the bowling composition.

"We have to see what the conditions are on match day, how the pitch will be. Still a day left. It's best to have a look and decide how things are with respect to the pitch as well as overhead conditions. We have a balanced team and all options are open to us depending on the conditions. We can't control the weather, we know the forecast but people here tell us that the forecast can change dramatically as well."

The Test series against South Africa will be the first competitive game for Rohit, Kohli and Bumrah since the 2023 ODI World Cup final loss to Australia in Ahmedabad last month. Dravid insisted that his team has moved on from the title clash heartbreak at home, pointing towards the race for qualifying for the 2025 World Test Championship final.

"It was a disappointment but you have to move on quickly in international cricket because there is another series coming up. All of these series count towards trying to qualify towards another ICC event in 2025. You don't have the time to stay down all the time.”

“You have to pick yourselves up and move on. The spirit in the camp is high, all the guys who have come in are really excited to play cricket. It's an exciting and tough place to play cricket in. While obviously there was disappointment about that (ODI World Cup final), I think we have all moved on from it and we have got to look ahead.”

“I thought we did well in the T20I series, we were able to pull back in it and the ODI team did well to win the series as well with players missing. The SA one-day team had a lot of their main batters in the side, we did really well. Guys are really looking forward to this and playing Test cricket again," he concluded.