As many as nine players that were part of India’s recently concluded Zimbabwe series have been named as part of the 15-man India ‘A’ squad scheduled to tour Australia for a series of two unofficial four-day matches and a quadrangular one-day series from August 13 to September 18. Wicketkeeper-batsman Naman Ojha has been named to lead the side on the monthlong assignment.
Naman Ojha has good memories of Australia tours with the India ‘A’ team, having scored a double-hundred and a hundred in a four-day match on the previous assignment there in 2014.
The tour will begin with the one-day series, with India A taking on Australia A in the opening match on August 14. The two other teams involved in the series are South Africa A and National Performance Squad.
The two ‘Test’ matches against Australia A are scheduled for September 8 to 11 and September 15 to 18 in Brisbane.
Herwadkar, Shankar in; Rayudu, Chahal, Rishi Dhawan, Mandeep out
Akhil Herwadkar of Mumbai and Vijay Shankar of Tamil Nadu were two youngsters to have been given surprise call-ups to the squad. Shankar is a 25-year-old middle order batsman who wishes to turn into a genuine all-rounder, while Herwadkar is a 21-year-old opening batsman who has been one of the most exciting phenomena in Indian domestic cricket over the last two years.
Sudip Chatterjee, Mandeep Singh, Jalaj Saxena, Krishna Das and Parvez Rasool are among those who missed out on being selected for the Australia tour, all of them having been part of the India ‘A’ squad in the Deodhar Trophy earlier this year.
Ambati Rayudu, despite having featured in the last India ‘A’ squad, and having given a good show of himself in Zimbabwe, also is unlucky to miss out. In the same boat are Yuzvendra Chahal and Rishi Dhawan, who were taken in the Zimbabwe team but were not found fit to travel to Australia.
India A Squad : Naman Ojha (C), Faiz Fazal, Akhil Herwadkar, Shreyas Iyer, Karun Nair, Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav, Vijay Shankar, Axar Patel, Jayant Yadav, Dhawal Kulkarni, Jaydev Unadkat, Barinder Sran, Shahbaz Nadeem and Sanju Samson.
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