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Probable Indian squad for the historic one-off Test against Afghanistan
By Sandy - May 4, 2018 8:07 pm
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BCCI will announce the Indian cricket squad for the upcoming historic one-off home Test match against Afghanistan on the upcoming Tuesday (May 8). Also in the same day, BCCI will announce the Indian squad for the next UK tour and India A squad for the England tour in June.

BCCI

Afghanistan will begin their first ever Test match journey on June 14 against India at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium (Bengaluru). Afghanistan will be the 12th team to play Test cricket, while 11th Test team Ireland will begin their Test cricket journey against Pakistan on next Friday (May 11).

Also read: Ireland Announces to the Squad for their Historic Debut Test Match

On May 8, Vinod Rai-led national selection committee will decide the Indian team squad for the upcoming historic one-off home Test match against Afghanistan.

A senior BCCI official told PTI, “There will be three squads that will be selected on May 8. The Afghanistan Test is from June 14-18, followed by UK tour that starts with two-match T20I series against Ireland in Dublin. The selectors will also name the India A squad that will tour England in June.”

India
Indian cricket team

According to various reports, BCCI will not select the strongest Indian cricket team squad for the Afghanistan Test match as some cricketers will busy at English county cricket in that period. Indian skipper Virat Kohli, Test specialist top-order batsman Cheteshwar Pujara, right-arm pacer Ishant Sharma are among the regular cricketers who will be busy in county cricket during that period.

Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara

Also read: Hardik Pandya, Dinesh Karthik to be part of World XI against West Indies

BCCI is not interested to force the cricketers to leave the county cricket for the historic Test match against Afghanistan.

Recently, Vinod Rai told ANI, “CoA has taken a conscious decision to encourage the players, especially Test specialists, to play county. And hone their skills for the England series. No question of stopping them to play versus Afghanistan. The team that played in Sri Lanka will play versus Afghanistan.

“Afghanistan is playing versus India and not Virat Kohli. No player (Cheteshwar Pujara especially) will be called back from the UK to play versus Afghanistan. Priority is England and to do well there, so, whatever it takes.”

It means some new or irregular players can be called up for the historic home Test match against Afghanistan. While Test vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane may take the leadership role, the in-form domestic cricketer Mayank Agarwal can be selected for the first time in the Indian squad. The 27-year-old top-order batsman scored 2,141 runs in the last domestic season which is the highest runs scored by any batsman in an Indian domestic season. He was the most runs scorer in both 2017/18 Ranji Trophy and 2017/18 Vijay Hazare trophy.

Moreover, Rishabh Pant can be selected as the second wicketkeeper after Wriddhiman Saha while BCCI can experiment with Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal in the spin option.

India’s probable 14-member squad for the one-off home Test against Afghanistan: Ajinkya Rahane (cap), KL Rahul, Murali Vijay, Rohit Sharma, Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Rishabh Pant (wk), Mayank Agarwal, Hardik Pandya, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Burmah, Umesh Yadav and Shardul Thakur.