India vs South Africa 2021-22: BCCI announces Test squad; Rohit Sharma to lead in ODIs

As India gears up for a vital tour of South Africa, the Test squad for the three-Test series has been announced by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). The announcement came on Wednesday, as it happened to be an experienced squad. However, there were four notable omissions due to injury concerns.

The team will be led by skipper Virat Kohli, while senior opener Rohit Sharma has been appointed as the vice-captain for the tour. Ajinkya Rahane, the former vice-captain, has been dropped from the duties due to his unstable form of late. He retains his spot in the team, uncertain of a direct playing XI opportunity, while Cheteshwar Pujara, too, maintains his place.

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“The following players were not available for selection due to injuries and are currently undergoing rehabilitation: Ravindra Jadeja, Shubman Gill, Axar Patel, Rahul Chahar,” the BCCI announced in its release. In the meantime, Navdeep Saini, Saurabh Kumar, Deepak Chahar and Arzan Nagwaswalla have been roped in as standby players.

Also, the BCCI has decided to hand the captaincy duties of the One-Day Internationals (ODIs) to Rohit, making him the all-rounder captain for India’s white-ball format. However, the ODI squad has not been announced yet and will be done in the coming days. It intends on waiting to get clarity on the injured players.

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IND’s Test squad for SA tour: Virat Kohli (c), Rohit Sharma (vc), KL Rahul (wk), Mayank Agarwal, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Shreyas Iyer, Hanuma Vihari, Rishabh Pant (wk), Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Jayant Yadav, Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Shami, Umesh Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Shardul Thakur and Mohammed Siraj.

India’s tour of South Africa 2021-22 (Full schedule)
1st Test: December 26-30 - Centurion
2nd Test: January 3-7 - Johannesburg
3rd Test: January 11-15 - Cape Town
1st ODI: January 19 - Paarl
2nd ODI: January 21- Paarl
3rd ODI: January 23 - Cape Town