In the absence of an injured M.S. Dhoni, Virat Kohli will lead the Indian side that will play five ODIs in Zimbabwe from July 24 to August 3. Off-spinner Parveez Rasool and Haryana seamer Mohit Sharma won maiden call-ups to the team. Rasool became the first player from Jammu & Kashmir to secure a place in the National squad.
Ajinkya Rahane, Cheteshwar Pujara, and Jaydev Unadkat were the others to be picked in the 15-man touring party. R. Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Ishant Sharma, and Umesh Yadav were rested, while M. Vijay was dropped.
Pujara was named captain of a 16-man India ‘A’ squad — featuring 10 of the India players in Zimbabwe —that will tour South Africa in August. Wriddhiman Saha and Vijay, too, were selected. The senior quartet of Virender Sehwag, Zaheer Khan, Gautam Gambhir, and Yuvraj Singh was ignored for both the squads.
India squad: Virat Kohli (capt.), Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma, Dinesh Karthik, Cheteshwar Pujara, Suresh Raina, Ambati Rayudu, Ajinkya Rahane, Ravindra Jadeja, Amit Mishra, Parveez Rasool, Shami Ahmed, R. Vinay Kumar, Jaydev Unadkat, Mohit Sharma.
India ‘A’ squad: Cheteshwar Pujara (capt.), Shikhar Dhawan, M. Vijay, Rohit Sharma, Suresh Raina, Ambati Rayudu, Dinesh Karthik, Ajinkya Rahane, Wriddhiman Saha, Parvez Rasool, Shahbaz Nadeem, Shami Ahmed, Stuart Binny, Ishwar Pandey, Jaydev Unadkat, Siddarth Kaul.
