It was an easy decision for the selectors to choose the 15-man squad for the three-match ODI series against Zimbabwe who met virtually on Saturday (July 30).
The main task for the selectors will emerge next week when they will join heads again to pick up the squad for Asia Cup. The deadline to announce the squad for Asia Cup 2022 is August 8.
It was an easy decision for the selectors to choose the 15-man squad for the three-match ODI series against Zimbabwe who met virtually on Saturday (July 30).
It can be said with a little degree of uncertainty that the team picked for Asia Cup 2022 will be the same as the one that will travel to Australia for the T20 World Cup later this year in October-November, excluding the probabilities of injuries.
The same groups of players are expected to feature in the six T20I games against Australia and South Africa in September and October.
The selectors want the team management a sufficient number of games to play before heading into the mega event.
It will be obvious that the selectors will back all the big guns for the Asia Cup – Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, and KL Rahul included. These three players are missing from the T20I squad in the West Indies due to personal and health reasons.
A health update on KL Rahul was discussed at the selection meeting on Saturday and it is learned that the Karnataka-based batsmen still have not fully recovered from Covid-19.
He is expected to get a complete recovery before the Asia Cup has been moved from UAE to Sri Lanka recently by the Asian Cricket Council (ACC). The tournament is set to start on August 27 with the final to be held on September 11.
The selectors are yet to announce the team for Asia Cup on August 8 and the T20 World Cup participants have four games against West Indies to decide the fate of the series. India leads the five-match series that ends on August 7 in Florida, US.
India T20I squad for West Indies:
Rohit Sharma (Captain), Ishan Kishan, Sanju Samson, Suryakumar Yadav, Deepak Hooda, Shreyas Iyer, Dinesh Karthik, Rishabh Pant, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, R Ashwin, Ravi Bishnoi, Kuldeep Yadav*, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Avesh Khan, Harshal Patel, Arshdeep Singh.
India’s ODI Squad for Zimbabwe Series:
Shikhar Dhawan (Capt), Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shubman Gill, Deepak Hooda, Rahul Tripathi, Ishan Kishan (wk), Sanju Samson (wk), Washington Sundar, Shardul Thakur, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Avesh Khan, Prasidh Krishna, Mohammed Siraj, Deepak Chahar.