Gaikwad, Venkatesh, Harshal and Avesh called up; Chahal returns; Rahul Chahar and Chakravarthy left out
The squad is without a number of first-choice players, among whom are Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, Ravindra Jadeja and Mohammed Shami. All four have been on the road virtually non-stop since the start of India’s tour of England – which began with the World Test Championship final in June – which was followed by the IPL and then the T20 World Cup, which India exited at the Super 12s stage. The allrounder Hardik Pandya and the fast bowler Shardul Thakur are also absent from the squad.
Of the players who were part of India’s squads for both the England tour and the T20 World Cup, only Rohit, Rahul, Rishabh Pant, R Ashwin and Suryakumar Yadav – who was flown in to the UK as a replacement for the injured Shubman Gill – have stayed on to face New Zealand.
This series will be first one under the charge of new India coach Rahul Dravid.
The BCCI also announced the India A team that will touring South Africa for three four-day matches starting November 23. Opener Prithvi Shaw and fast bowler Umran Malik are part of this team.
India A squad for South Africa tour: Priyank Panchal (capt), Prithvi Shaw, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Devdutt Padikkal, Sarfaraz Khan, B Aparajith, Upendra Yadav (wk), K Gowtham, Rahul Chahar, Saurabh Kumar, Navdeep Saini, Umran Malik, Ishan Porel, Arzan Nagwaswalla