Dean Elgar lived up to his reputation as a dogged, street-fighting batsman as he held the Indian bowling attack at bay, scoring a patient 46 off 121 balls.
Ravichandran Ashwin, who was left out of the first Test, is back in the mix as Shardul Thakur seems to have done his hamstring some damage during the training session at Lord's on Monday.
Rohit Sharma finally had his first stint of outdoor training after spending weeks indoors.
Who do you think should be part of India's playing XI in the first Test against England, starting on Wednesday?
The dominance of Saurashtra's bowlers could be gauged from the fact that Himachal lost their first seven wickets for just 22 runs.
Arun Lal's "very poor pitch" comment on the opening day drew a sharp rebuttal from the Saurashtra Cricket Association on Wednesday after its curator, Mahendra Rajdev, said the Bengal coach erred in his judgement by jumping the gun in the ongoing Ranji Trophy final in Rajkot.
'They have got tremendous depth in their squad, the big guns are back and they are a quality outfit under the leadership of Virat Kohli.'
Natarajan was added to the Test squad for the remaining two Test matches against Australia on January 1.
India will hope the return of regular captain Virat Kohli proves to be the difference for the hosts against New Zealand when the world's two top-ranked Test sides clash in the second and final match at the Wankhede Stadium from Friday.
Pujara's slowest Test half-century, a painstaking 50 off 176 balls handed Australia control of the match in which they now have overall lead of 197 runs.
Ishant Sharma and his pace colleagues wreaked havoc with the pink ball to put India in charge of their maiden day-night Test against Bangladesh at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata.
The 30-year-old notched up his 16th hundred in his 65th Test at the Adelaide Oval, reaching the 5000-mark landmark in 108 innings, the same as the legendary Rahul Dravid, who made the No 3 slot his own.
According to Jaffer, Axar can leave his mark as English batsmen tend to struggle against left-arm spinners.
Images from Day 1 of the fourth Test between England and India, at The Oval, on Thursday.
Pacer Ollie Robinson destroyed India's batting line-up with a five-wicket haul to power England to a huge victory by an innings and 76 runs, on Day 4 of the third Test, at Leeds on Saturday.
Pacer Craig Overton says England still hold all the aces going into Day 4 of the third Test against India, at Headingley, Leeds, on Saturday.
'I am sure there is enough time for us to prepare and guys are looking forward to this series. This is the best opportunity for us to win our first series in South Africa. So all of us are looking forward to it.'
'They came out with an attitude that they had nothing to lose.' 'That's what stands out about this team.'
Parthiv Patel gave his views on on what the World Test Championship title would mean for Virat Kohli.
The 6'7" seam-bowling all-rounder's inclusion in Australia's line-up was expected after his impressive hundred in the first warm-up game against India A.
Images from Day 2 of the fourth Test between Australia and India, at the Gabba, on Saturday.
Australia's in-depth planning to subdue Cheteshwar Pujara worked out well in the opening Test but spinner Nathan Lyon says it would be a massive challenge to keep the world-class batsman quiet through the remainder of the series.
Green was attended to by the medical team and was able to walk off the field.
Former India fielding coach R Sridhar reflected on the ups and downs of his seven-year tenure.
In what comes as the biggest positive for Indian cricket in recent times, former captain Rahul Dravid has agreed to take over as the head coach of the men's team.
After helping Saurashtra win their maiden Ranji Trophy title last month, little did he know that he would be spending all his time at home. Pujara is enjoying the 'forced' break and most of his time goes into entertaining his two-year-old daughter.
Bess impressed in his maiden outing on Indian soil
There is a possibility that some of the senior India players may play against England Lions when they tour India for a full-fledged series in end January-February.
"I know the importance of opening the innings. I am glad I could make it count. It's always important to embrace the challenge, it's not going to be easy. Back in Durham we had time off to look at our training and technique and after the World Test Championship final we had 20-25 days, that was a real game-changer."
Rohit Sharma completed a century in each innings in his maiden Test as opener as India pressed for victory in the first Test against South Africa by setting the touring side a daunting target of 395.
India's Shreyas Iyer once again dazzled on his debut Test, hitting his second 50-plus score of the match to put his team in charge of the opening Test against New Zealand on Sunday.
Images from Day 2 in the first Test between England and India, at Trent Bridge, Nottingham, on Thursday.
Some of the Indian players, including captain Virat Kohli, coach Ravi Shastri and members of the support staff also landed in Chennai -- where the first two Tests will be played.
India's captain Virat Kohli will have to think overtime about the balance of his squad, with a long tail, often bushy with runs, and just two openers -- one untested (Rohit Sharma) but very capable and another supremely talented (KL Rahul) but highly reluctant starter.
Rohit Sharma has overtaken captain Virat Kohli to become the top-ranked Test batsman from India.
Batting coach Vikram Rathour on Saturday said that a first innings score of 250-plus will put India in a fighting position against New Zealand, keeping the prevailing conditions in Southampton in mind during the ICC World Test Championship final.
The Indian team took to the nets at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Wednesday with all of their players going through a rigorous training session.
Wriddhiman Saha is confident that Bengal's unheralded bunch of bowlers have seen enough of Cheteshwar Pujara on television to plot his dismissal when they take on Saurashtra in the Ranji Trophy final, starting in Rajkot on Monday.
The team has five stand-bys in Priyank Panchal, KS Bharat, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Shahbaz Nadeem and Rahul Chahar.
The batting was a big letdown for the Indians with Virat Kohli, Hanuma Vihari, Shubman Gill and Shreyas Iyer failing in both innings, while Shardul Thakur's selection over Ravichandran Ashwin turned out to be a big mistake.
