IND vs SA: BCCI gives major update on Shreyas Iyer's participation in ODIs - Is it the right decision?

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BCCI has provided a big update on Shreyas Iyer's availability for the upcoming ODI series against South Africa.

Shreyas Iyer was included in both T20I and ODI squads but is yet to play a game in the South Africa tour. The batter sat out the T20I matches and is likely to play his first match on Sunday in the 1st ODI, but now BCCI has given a huge update on him.

The apex body of Indian cricket announced on Saturday that Shreyas Iyer will only be available for the first ODI match, and won't take part beyond that. India are set to play a three-match ODI series against the Proteas and Iyer will be unavailable for the last two matches.

Shreyas Iyer to play intra-squad Test Match

Shreyas Iyer is instead set to be part of India's intra-squad Test match. The Indian team members and some of the India A members will play in a Red Ball practice match before the two-match Test series against South Africa which follows the ODI series.

Iyer, who is also part of the Test squad, will be playing the intra-squad match along with other senior players like Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Ravichandran Ashwin and others. India A members like Pradosh Paul, Sarfaraz Khan and others who recently did extremely well against South Africa A are also set to play the match.

India Squad for Intra-Squad Test Match

Rohit Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Devdutt Padikkal, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Sarfaraz Khan, Pradosh Ranjan Paul, KS Bharat (wk), Dhruv Jurel (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin, Pulkit Narang, Harshit Rana, Shardul Thakur, Sourabh Kumar, Manav Suthar, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, Vidhwath Kaverappa, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Navdeep Saini

Is it the right decision from BCCI?

As much as Shreyas Iyer would have loved to play the ODIs, the immediate focus for India will be to get their World Test Championship 2023-25 cycle campaign back on track. In order to do so, team India will have to do extremely well in the Test series against South Africa and this will be the perfect opportunity for Iyer to prepare for the upcoming challenge.

The ODI team will definitely miss his plaudits, but for the greater good, Iyer's participation in the Test match is the right thing to do.