Former pacer Stuart Broad and current England batter Jos Buttler have picked Jofra Archer as a bowler who might seriously test Shubman Gill, the India skipper in scorching form, as India gets ready to play England in the third Test at Lord's. With three hundreds, including a double hundred in the second Test at Edgbaston, Gill has been the series' most impressive player thus far. The right-hander has now scored 585 runs at an average of 146.25 in the two Test matches, solidifying his position as the key player in India's impressive start to the five-match series.

In an episode of Broad's podcast, Love of Cricket, Buttler and Broad discussed their opinions on Archer's possible influence in the forthcoming Test. They both talked about how Archer may be a good choice for England given his speed and his performance against Gill in T20 games.

"He was just cruising. It didn’t look like anything could trouble him...He didn’t do anything badly. Maybe a bit unlucky. But once Gill got in, goodness me — that move to No. 4! He spent most of his career so far opening the batting, averaging around 30. Since Virat Kohli retired, he’s moved to number four and gone on to score a hundred, a big double, a big 150 — just awesome.It looks like he’s got no weaknesses at all," Broad said.

"I think the ball that nips back and tries to get him bowled is still an option. Obviously, Jofra Archer will be coming back into the side at Lord’s, I imagine — not that I’m picking the team — but he did get Shubman bowled in the IPL, nipping one back through the gate. But other than that, he’s a very correct player. India produce a lot of technically very correct players," Buttler said.

Despite being added to England's team prior to the Birmingham Test, Archer was left out of the starting lineup. Concerns over his recent comeback to red-ball cricket—he had only played one first-class match for Sussex after being away from the game for almost four years—led to his exclusion. Given the Indian batting's recent performance, several commentators had questioned whether choosing Archer at such a critical juncture would have been risky.

Nonetheless, the figures give England's ambitions some encouragement. Gill has played three innings against Archer in Test matches, accumulating just 18 runs and getting out twice. During that time, the Indian hitter has only achieved two boundaries against Archer, and his strike rate against him is 64, indicating that the England pacer has been able to challenge him to some extent. It is one of the few games that has statistically favored England thus far in the series, despite the small sample size.

England's hopes of winning the series will depend on Gill's wicket, since he just finished with a dominant 269-run knock at Edgbaston, which helped India win their first-ever Test match there. Although it is still unclear if Archer will be included in the Lord's Test playing XI, the debate around his selection illustrates England's efforts to find solutions to halt India's progress.

Captain Ben Stokes and coach Brendon McCullum will make the final call, although Archer might be a strong contender given his speed, bounce, and record against Gill.