The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) have announced the squad for the remaining two One Day International matches against Australia.
India have already sealed the series by winning the first three matches and now they will look to whitewash the Aussies and send a strong message across to all other team who will tour India in the coming months.
India have outplayed Australia in all three departments of the game in the series so far. The selectors made a bold call to rest the likes of Ravindra Jadeja and Ravichandran Ashwin and give young spinners– Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal– a chance, and it needs to be said that the young guns have created a huge problem for the selectors by giving good performances. Now, it will be difficult for them to ignore these two while picking squad for future series.
Coming back to the squad, India have made just one change to their squad for the final two ODIs against Australia. Axar Patel is coming back in place of Ravindra Jadeja. Interestingly, Shikhar Dhawan, who requested to miss the first three matches, has also not been picked in the squad.
Axar Patel was released for the first three ODIs because he picked an injury in a practise session before the first match. And, Ravindra Jadeja, who was initially rested for the series, was asked to replace him in the squad. Axar Patel has recovered from the injury and he will once again join the squad for the last two ODIs.
Now that India have already sealed the series, they would look to make some changes in the remaining ODIs and give chance to players who haven’t featured in the playing XI so far. Indian captain Virat Kohli also hinted towards making some changes in the remaining matches of the series.
“We may give opportunities for people from now, but all 15 guys know that we have got to be ruthless once we step onto the field. I know it won’t happen every single day, but at least that mindset is there. Credit to the whole squad for the series win, but the journey stops only after the final game.”
Squad: Virat Kohli (C), Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav, Ajinkya Rahane, MS Dhoni, Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Umesh Yadav and Mohammad Shami.
