Dipika Pallikal bemused by Dinesh Karthik and Hardik Pandya's camaraderie

The Indian team is presently in England where they recently took part in the T20I series against Ireland followed by a three-match T20I series and a three-match ODI series against England. While the Men in Blue won the 20-overs fixtures, they couldn’t replicate their form in the ODI series against the Brits and lost the same 1-2 after taking a lead by winning the first match at Trent Bridge in Nottingham.

In the five-match Test series, Virat Kohli and his team have a tough task ahead of them. Back in 2011 and 2014, the Indian team was beaten and this time around the visiting team would be hoping to make amends. While a number of players have returned home following the coloured-clothing fixtures, a few players have stayed back for the Test series, Hardik Pandya and Dinesh Karthik are two of them.

Tough road ahead for Pandya and Karthik

Pandya played in all the limited-overs matches and made some useful contributions with both bat and ball. He commenced his UK campaign with a nine-ball 32 against Gary Wilson’s men in Dublin. He picked up a four-wicket-haul against the Three Lions in the final T20I in Bristol. In the ODI series, the all-rounder couldn’t quite step up and deliver, however, came back to score an impressive fifty against Essex.

Karthik, on the other hand, has only played a couple of matches thus far. Nevertheless, he is the first-choice keeper in the Test lineup and is expected to play most of the games. Meanwhile, both Hardik Pandya and Karthik have had a gala time prior to the red-ball fixtures. Recently, Pandya posted a picture on Instagram along with the wicketkeeper-batsman and humourously mentioned him as his ‘number one love’.

He wrote, “My no. 1 love ❤️ @dk00019”

Here is Pandya’s post

My no. 1 love ❤️ @dk00019

A post shared by Hardik Pandya (@hardikpandya93) on Jul 30, 2018 at 5:44am PDT

In the meantime, Dipika Pallikal, Karthik’s better-half, had a funny reply in store for the friendship between Pandya and Karthik. She replied and wrote, “Clearly, I’ve been replaced;; Thanks guys…..”

Here is the screenshot of Dipika’s reply

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