Immediately after loss in 3rd Test, Australia make change in their squad

Australia team: Labuschagne did not replace in the already 13-man squad that was selected for the recently-concluded Test, which means Australia have increased their squad strength to 14 for the Sydney Test.

Almost immediately after losing the third Test, Australia made a change to their squad by adding all-rounder Marnus Labuschagne for the final Test match at Sydney starting on January 3.

With no chance of winning the series after conceding a 1-2 lead to India, a few changes were expected in the hosts line-up. However, there was no radical change in the squad and in fact, Labuschagne did not replace in the already 13-man squad that was selected for the recently-concluded Test, which means Australia have increased their squad strength to 14 for the Sydney Test.

There were questions marks over the places of opener Aaron Finch and middle-order batsman Shaun Marsh after their below-par show in the series so far but the Australian think tank have decided to back the under-fire cricketers.

“We think we’ve got the best group of players available to us at the moment and we’ll pick the best combination for that group that we think will win the last Test,” Paine told Cricketaustralia.com.au

The Australian captain did suggest a few changes for the series-decider including the thought of Finch sliding down the order.

Labuschagne, on the other hand, is coming on the back of some decent scores in domestic cricket. 52, 4, 47, 21 and 78 were his scores in the final three matches before the mid-season break.

Labuschagne, who made his debut against Pakistan in UAE, is also a handy leg-spinner, which may pave way for him in the Sydney Test, which is known to assist the spinners.

"From what we’re hearing, it’ll probably spin quite a bit so once we see that for ourselves, we’ll start to think about the best combination for ourselves to win that Test."

Australia squad: Tim Paine (c, wk), Josh Hazlewood (vc), Mitch Marsh (vc), Pat Cummins, Aaron Finch, Peter Handscomb, Marcus Harris, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Shaun Marsh, Peter Siddle, Mitchell Starc

India squad: Virat Kohli (c), Murali Vijay, KL Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Hardik Pandya, Hanuma Vihari, Rohit Sharma, Rishabh Pant (wk), Parthiv Patel (wk), Ravi Ashwin, Ravi Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, Umesh Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar