Indian cricket will test its bench strength as it hosts South Africa ‘A’ and Australia ‘A’ in the coming months.
The selection committee, which met here on Monday, gave opportunity to all the fringe players as they announced the India ‘A’ squad for the two four-day matches against South Africa, starting July 30. They also announced India ‘A’ and India ‘B’ squads for a quadrangular series, beginning on August 17 and featuring South Africa ‘A’ and Australia ‘A’.
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The selectors named Yuzvendra Chahal in the Shreyas Iyer-led India ‘A’ side for the four-day games against the Proteas.
Two left-arm spinners, Axar Patel and Shahbaz Nadeem, will get one match each.
The presence of Rajneesh Gurbani, Navdeep Saini, Ankit Rajpoot and Mohammed Siraj, who did well in the domestic season, will test the pace reserve.
Several players have been named in the India ‘A’ and ‘B’ squads, to be captained by Iyer and Manish Pandey respectively, following their fine performances in the Indian Premier League.
The committee also picked the squads for Duleep Trophy, which will open the 2018-19 domestic calendar on August 17. Faiz Fazal, Abhinav Mukund and Parthiv Patel will be the skippers of India Blue, India Red and India Green respectively.
Wicketkeeper Abhishek Gupta was initially a part of the India Red squad. He was replaced by Akshay Wadkar as he is still serving his eight-month ban for a doping violation. The ban will end on September 14.
The squad for the four-day matches against Australia ‘A’ — to be held in September — will be announced soon.
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