Bangladesh captain Shakib Al Hasan won the toss and opted to bat in the second Test in Mirpur. The hosts made two changes, bringing in Mominul Haque for Yasir Ali and Taskin Ahmed for Ebadot Hossain, who has a back injury.
KL Rahul had taken a blow to his hand while batting in the nets on Wednesday but was fit to lead India once again in Rohit Sharma's absence. He said India too would have batted first but he was "not very disappointed" at losing the toss.
India made one change to their XI: Jaydev Unadkat, whose only Test so far was in 2010, replaced Kuldeep Yadav. Between his two appearances, India played 118 Tests. Kuldeep was the Player of the Match in the first Test for his eight wickets in the match and 40 with the bat. But given the grass on the pitch, India decided to go with three seamers and two spinners.
Shakib somewhat agreed with India's assessment, saying for the first couple of hours, the seamers may get some help, but from day three onwards spinners would be more effective. On the eve of the match, Bangladesh's fast-bowling coach Allan Donald had confirmed that Shakib would bowl in this Test, which means the hosts had three spinners and two seamers.
India are currently second on the World Test Championship points table; a win here will further boost their chances of making a second successive final.
Bangladesh: 1 Najmul Hossain Shanto, 2 Zakir Hasan, 3 Mominul Haque, 4 Litton Das, 5 Shakib Al Hasan (capt), 6 Mushfiqur Rahim, 7 Nurul Hasan (wk), 8 Mehidy Hasan Miraz, 9 Taijul Islam, 10 Taskin Ahmed, 11 Khaled Ahmed
India: 1 Shubman Gill, 2 KL Rahul (capt), 3 Cheteshwar Pujara 4 Virat Kohli, 5 Rishabh Pant (wk), 6 Shreyas Iyer, 7 Axar Patel, 8 R Ashwin, 9 Jaydev Unadkat, 10 Umesh Yadav, 11 Mohammed Siraj
Source: ESPNcricinfo