Mumbai: Injured batting duo of KL Rahul and Shreyas Iyer have been selected for the upcoming Asia Cup 2023 tournament, which gets underway on August 30. Both Rahul and Iyer have been given the ‘green light’ by National Cricket Academy (NCA) doctor Dr Nitin Patel to return to international cricket.
India have dropped Sanju Samson and even Yuzvendra Chahal have been dropped but youngsters Tilak Varma has got his first call-up into the Indian ODI side. Suryakumar Yadav has been retained in the ODI side as well.
We have got luxury of picking 17 members. We saw some real promise, not just performance but temperament. It will be good exposure for him. When time comes to pick team for World Cup, we can take call on this, chairman of selectors Ajit Agarkar told the media on Monday.
Sanju Samson will be travelling as a back-up for KL Rahul as he has developed a niggle. “Shreyas Iyer has been declared completely fit but KL Rahul has developed a niggle and that’s why Sanju Samson will be travelling as backup. We have got time till September 5 to pick the squad for World Cup, so we’ll take call on him later,” Agarkar added.
India squad: Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Varma, Ishan Kishan, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Shami, Mohammed Siraj, Kuldeep Yadav, Prasidh Krishna
Backup: Sanju Samson (WK)