Courtesy: BCCI
On Friday, October 25, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) announced an 18-member Indian squad for the five-match Border Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) Test series against Australia down under next month. Rohit Sharma will be captaining the Indian cricket team on the high profile tour to Australia, but they won’t be touring with Kuldeep Yadav and Mohammed Shami, who have not been picked due to their respective injuries.
Notably, fast bowler Mohammed Shami has been out of the Indian cricket team since the ODI World Cup last year due to multiple injuries, while left-arm unorthodox spinner Kuldeep Yadav, who was in the playing XI against New Zealand in Bengaluru Test earlier this month, won’t be making the trip due to a chronic left groin issue. As per the press release from Indian cricket’s governing body, Kuldeep Yadav will be going to the BCCI Centre of Excellence in Bengaluru to get long term resolution of his injury after the ongoing Test series versus the Black Caps.
India give maiden Test call-ups to Abhimanyu Easwaran, Harshit Rana, and Nitish Kumar Reddy
With injuries to a couple of key players, who have been a part of India’s last two Test series triumphs down under, the Indian selection committee has picked three uncapped players for the upcoming tour to Australia. Abhimanyu Easwaran, Harshit Rana, and Nitish Kumar Reddy received their maiden Test call-ups, and they will be in consideration to make their long format debut versus a daunting opponent in their own den.
After losing the first Test of the three-match series in Bengaluru against New Zealand, the Indian cricket team are currently staring down the barrel in the second Test in Pune after two days of cricket. With a first Test series defeat at home in 12 years being a possibility, India will have to drastically improve their performance to stand toe-to-toe with a highly motivated Australian cricket team, who will be looking to exact revenge for losing to them twice in the last two Test series at home.
The first of the five Test matches of the BGT will begin at the Optus Stadium in Perth on November 22, while the remaining four Tests will be played in Adelaide (D/N), Brisbane, Melbourne, and Sydney.
India’s squad for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy vs Australia: Rohit Sharma (c), Jasprit Bumrah (vc), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, Rishabh Pant (wk), Sarfaraz Khan, Dhruv Jurel (wk), R Ashwin, R Jadeja, Mohd. Siraj, Akash Deep, Prasidh Krishna, Harshit Rana, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Washington Sundar
Reserves: Mukesh Kumar, Navdeep Saini, Khaleel Ahmed
