Rohit Sharma has been ruled out for the tour of South Africa as he has not yet recovered fully from the hamstring injury, giving KL Rahul the captaincy reigns for the ODI series.
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KL Rahul has been named as the ODI captain for the upcoming series against South Africa after Rohit Sharma was ruled out. Rohit, who has been suffering from a hamstring injury, has not sufficiently recovered for the tour. The series against South Africa would have been Rohit Sharma’s first series as full-time ODI skipper. Before the tour, the BCCI declared that Virat Kohli would remain only as the Test captain while Rohit would take charge as the ODI and T20I captain.
The development was confirmed by BCCI Chairman of Selectors Chetan Sharma in a virtual press conference. Sharma stated, “We are looking at KL Rahul as a three-format player, and he has got good experience of captaincy. He has proved his leadership qualities. That is what all selectors think. When Rohit is not fit, we thought KL is the best one to handle the side. We have good confidence in him, and we are grooming him.”
Rahul has had experience captaining the Punjab Kings in IPL. But, with Rahul appointed as the vice-captain for the tour, it was only expected that he would step up to the captaincy.
Read | KL Rahul named vice-captain for the tour of South Africa
The years 2022 and 2023 are important for the Indian cricket team. The Twenty20 World Cup is in October and it will be held in Australia. After that, the ICC World Cup will be held in India after a gap of 12 years. Chetan Sharma has stated that keeping Rohit fit for these two tournaments was the reason why they decided to rest Rohit Sharma for the South Africa tour.
“This is the only reason why we have decided to let him work on his rehab, work on his fitness, work on his muscles. Nobody gets injured on purpose. This is precisely why we didn’t send him to South Africa because we want him to go back to 100 percent fitness because there are important events and World Cups coming,” Chetan Sharma said.
The squad has also seen some major changes. Ruturaj Gaikwad, who had a brilliant Vijay Hazare Trophy, has been selected in the side along with Venkatesh Iyer. Washington Sundar has also been included in the team in the back of solid domestic performances. The Indian cricket team will also welcome Ravichandran Ashwin back in the ODI setup. Ashwin had last played an ODI in 2017 but was not considered since then.
There is no place for Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel as they recover from injuries. Mohammed Shami, who enjoyed a special Centurion Test, has also been rested from the ODI set-up in order to manage workload. Jasprit Bumrah is the vice-captain. The likes of Hardik Pandya, Krunal Pandya, Kuldeep Yadav, Shubman Gill, and T Natarajan have also been dropped. Ishan Kishan will be the backup keeper while Yuzvendra Chahal returns. Prasidh Krishna has also been selected
The three ODIs will be played on January 19,21 and 23. The venues will be at Paarl and Cape Town.
KL Rahul (c), Shikhar Dhawan, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Shreyas Iyer, Venkatesh Iyer, Rishabh Pant (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Yuzvendra Chahal, R Ashwin, Washington Sundar, Jasprit Bumrah (vc), Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Deepak Chahar, Prasidh Krishna, Shardul Thakur, Mohammed Siraj
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