Thaindian News

Mumbai, July 31 (ANI): The national cricket selection committee headed by K. Srikanth, on Saturday, named a 15-member squad for next month’s tri-services involving India, New Zealand and Sri Lanka.

The selectors opted to rest Sachin Tendulkar, Harbhajan Singh and Gautam Gambhir, and recalled middle-order batsman Yuvraj Singh who was dropped for the Asia Cup last month on grounds of poor form and fitness, besides disciplinary issues.

The series in Sri Lanka begins from August 10 and ends on August 25.

Tamil Nadu off-spinner R Ashwin and Jharkhand batsman Saurabh Tiwary, two promising youngsters who have done well in the domestic circuit, have been retained in the squad to be led by Mahendra Singh Dhoni.

India’s pace spearheads Zaheer Khan and S. Sreesanth have been ruled out with injuries. Ashish Nehra will lead the pace attack which also has Ishant Sharma, Abhimanyu Mithun and Praveen Kumar.

“Ashok Dinda and Manish Pandey will replace R Ashwin and Sourav Tiwary in the Indian team participating in the Emerging Players tournament in Australia,” BCCI secretary Srinivasan said in a statement.

The batting will largely depend on Virender Sehwag, Rohit Sharma, Suresh Raina and Virat Kohli.

In the absence of Gambhir, Tamil Nadu wicket-keeper batsman Dinesh Karthik is likely to open the innings with Sehwag.

Ravindra Jadeja is the lone all-rounder in the squad although there are a number of batsmen who are known to be part time bowlers.

The squad is as follows: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (C), Virender Sehwag (VC), Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, Rohit Sharma, Yuvraj Singh, Ravindra Jadeja, Dinesh Karthik, R Ashwin, Praveen Kumar, Ishant Sharma, Abhimanyu Mithun, Ashish Nehra, Pragyan Ojha and Saurabh Tiwary. (ANI)