Chief selector Chetan Sharma and his committee picked four different teams for the NZ and Bangladesh tours
Prithvi Shaw and Sarfaraz Khan
Team India will travel to New Zealand without two key batsmen—Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli. In their absence, all-rounder Hardik Pandya will lead the team in the three T20Is starting in Wellington on November 18. However, Pandya is not in the ODI squad, which will be led by Shikhar Dhawan for a three-match ODI series beginning in Auckland on November 25.
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Interestingly, Rishabh Pant, who was not part of the playing XI in the three T20I World Cup games in Australia, will be deputy to both Pandya and Dhawan on the NZ tour. Apart from Rohit and Kohli, opener KL Rahul was also rested from the white-ball series. Rohit and Rahul will return as skipper and deputy skipper respectively for the ODI sand two-Test series in Bangladesh in December and so will Kohli.
Chetan Sharma
Chief selector Chetan Sharma and his committee picked four different teams for the NZ and Bangladesh tours. However, there was no place for two performing Mumbai boys—Prithvi Shaw and Sarfaraz Khan—who have scored tons of runs in domestic cricket this season.
“We are in constant touch with Prithvi and he is doing well. There is nothing wrong at all. The thing is that we need to look at the set-up…players who are already playing and the guys who are performing. Those are getting chances. He will definitely get his chance very soon the way he is batting,” Chetan said during a virtual press conference from Perth on Monday.
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When asked about Sarfaraz, the chief selector remarked: “Sarfaraz is a brilliant player. The selectors are regularly in touch with him and I spoke with him several times. He is not that far away. Sometimes you need to work more hard to enter the team, because players are already there. Otherwise, Sarfaraz has done his job and he is regularly doing it. He is a serious contender. We [selectors] discussed him a lot today [Monday] and he will definitely get a chance very soon.” Test specialist middle-order batsman Hanuma Vihari, who played his last Test against England at Birmingham in July, failed to retain his place.
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