Headlines
Dhoni, Kohli rested, Rahane to lead India
New Delhi, June 29
Middle-order batsman
Ajinkya Rahane was on Monday made captain of the 15-member Indian
cricket team that will tour Zimbabwe in July as Mahendra Singh Dhoni and
Virat Kohli among other seniors were rested.
Opening batsman
Shikhar Dhawan, Suresh Raina, Ravichandran Ashwin, Rohit Sharma and
Umesh Yadav along with Dhoni and Kohli were rested by the Board of
Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI) All-India Senior Selection
Committee which met here on Monday.
India will play three One-Day Internationals (ODI) and two Twenty20 Internationals from July 10 to 19 in Harare.
Meanwhile,
another middle-order bat, Cheteshwar Pujara, has been named skipper of
the India A squad for the two four-day games against Australia A. Both
the games will be played in Chennai -- from July 22 to 25 and from July
29 to August 1.
This will be the first time legendary Rahul
Dravid will be in-charge of the A team since he was appointed India
Under-19 and India A coach earlier this month.
Chairman of
selectors Sandeep Patil said the rested players were given a lay-off
period on their own request. India have been playing cricket continually
since the Australia series which started last year in November.
Meanwhile,
all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja's name does not figure in the squad -
impliedly, he has been dropped. The southpaw's performance has dipped
off-late. However, despite being "rested" from the India squad, pace
bowler Yadav was still named in the India A team.
No specialist
wicketkeeper has been named in the squad but Robin Uthappa, Kedar Jadhav
and Ambati Rayudu, all of whom have been selected, have kept wickets in
the past.
Meanwhile, veteran off-spinner Harbhajan Singh made a
comeback to the ODI squad in four years. He last played an ODI in June
2011 against the West Indies while he was last picked for T20Is in
September 2012 against Australia. He will be accompanied by left-arm
tweaker Axar Patel and leggie Karn Sharma.
Murali Vijay, who is a
regular opener in Tests, is likely to partner Rahane at the top of the
order as Manish Pandey and Manoj Tiwary are the other batsmen named in
the squad. Among pacers, Dhawal Kulkarni, Stuart Binny, Bhuvneshwar
Kumar and Mohit Sharma were retained with Punjab's uncapped Sandeep
Sharma joining them.
Team director Ravi Shastri will not travel
to Zimbabwe due to "prior engagements" but other members of the support
staff will will go with the team.
The teams are:
India
squad: Ajinkya Rahane (captain), Murali Vijay, Ambati Rayudu, Manoj
Tiwary, Kedar Jadhav, Robin Uthappa, Manish Pandey, Harbhajan Singh,
Axar Patel, Karn Sharma, Dhawal Kulkarni, Stuart Binny, Bhuvneshwar
Kumar, Mohit Sharma, Sandeep Sharma.
India A squad: Cheteshwar
Pujara (Captain), Lokesh Rahul, Abhinav Mukund, Karun Nair, Shreyas
Iyer, Naman Ojha, Vijay Shankar, Amit Mishra, Pragyan Ojha, Shardul
Thakur, Varun Aaron, Abhimanyu Mithun, Umesh Yadav, Shreyas Gopal, Baba
Aparajith.