Sanju out of Twenty20 series against Aussies; Surya to lead, top stars rested

Mumbai – The Indian cricket team has been announced for the Twenty20 series against Australia starting on 23rd of this month. Suryakumar Yadav will lead the team in a situation where the prominent players in the World Cup team have been rested. Malayali star Sanju beat Samson again. Ishan Kishan and Jitesh Sharma are the wicket keepers. Rituraj Gaekwad will be the vice-captain in the first three matches. Shreyas Iyer, who will return to the team in the final two matches, will be the vice-captain.

The series consists of five matches. V.V.S. Laxman is the coach of the team. The first match will be played in Visakhapatnam on Thursday. The second match will be played in Thiruvananthapuram on Sunday. The third match will be played in Bengaluru on December 3.

Earlier, Sanju was not given a place in the Asia Cup and World Cup teams. After his poor performance in the World Cup, Suryakumar Yadav was appointed as the captain. It was rumored that Sanju would return to the team in the series where the top players were rested.

Suryakumar Yadav, Ishan Kishan and Prasath Krishna are the only ones in the team for the Twenty20 series among those who were in the World Cup squad that concluded yesterday. Hardik Pandya, who was injured during the World Cup, has not been considered for the team. Meanwhile, despite being in the World Cup squad, Akshar Patel, who was ruled out due to injury, has returned to the team. R. Ashwin was included in the World Cup team instead of Akshar Patel.

Sanju was dropped when the team that played in the series against Ireland was kept largely the same. Jasprit Bumrah, who led the team in that series, was rested. Although the selectors initially decided to appoint Shreyas Iyer as the captain by playing in all the five matches, considering the workload of the player, they allowed rest from the first three matches. Iyer, who will return for the final two matches in Raipur and Bengaluru, will be vice-captain.

India Squad: Suryakumar Yadav (captain), Rituraj Gaekwad (vice-captain), Ishan Kishan, Yashaswi Jaiswal, Thilak Verma, Rinku Singh, Jitesh Sharma (wicketkeeper), Washington Sundar, Akshar Patel, Shivam Dubey, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh, Prasath Krishna, Atush Khan and Mukesh Kumar.