Indian squad for tour of England announced; Gautam Gambhir returns to Test team

Gautam Gambhir

Gautam Gambhir has made a comeback into the Test squad for the tour of England, after spending more than 18 months out of the team.

The squad, announced on Wednesday, includes one new face in Stuart Binny. Uncapped pacers Pankaj Singh and Ishwar Pandey also find themselves in the 18-man squad.

It is a fairly inexperienced squad with only three players from the squad – MS Dhoni, Gambhir, Ishant Sharma – having played Tests in England before. Wriddhiman Saha has been picked as the back-up wicket-keeper to Dhoni.

Surprisingly, the selectors have decided to go with only two specialist spinners in Ravindra Jadeja and R Ashwin.

Gambhir last played for India back in December 2012. It’ll be interesting to see if he is drafted into XI directly, or is used a back-up for Shikhar Dhawan and Murali Vijay.

Dhoni’s men will be hoping to better the performance from 2011, when India were whitewashed in a 4-match Test series. The first Test is scheduled to start on July 9 at Trent Bridge, Nottingham.

Full squad:

MS Dhoni (c), Murali Vijay, Shikhar Dhawan, Gautam Gambhir, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, Rohit Sharma, Ravindra Jadeja, R Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Mohammed Shami, Ishwar Pandey, Ishant Sharma, Stuart Binny, Varun Aaron, Wriddhiman Saha, Pankaj Singh