Suryakumar Yadav named captain for India vs Australia T20I series, Sanju Samson faces another snub

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Suryakumar Yadav was named captain of India's T20I side for the five-match T20I series against Australia starting November 23 in Visakhapatnam. Ruturaj Gaikwad has been named vice-captain for the first three T20Is. Sanju Samson has not been included in the 15-member squad.

Ishan Kishan and Prasidh Krishna are the only other player part of the India World Cup 2023 squad who will be available for selection in all the five T20Is. The other members of the just-concluded ICC tournament have been rested.

Shreyas Iyer, who scored third-highest runs for India in World Cup 2023, will join the squad as vice-captain for the last two T20Is in Raipur and Bengaluru.

Gaikwad was India's captain of the Asian Games 2023 squad which won gold in China in October. Nine other players who took part in Asian Games 2023 - Yashasvi Jaiswal, Tilak Varma, Rinku Singh, Jitesh Sharma (wk), Washington Sundar, Shivam Dubey, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh and Avesh Khan - have also found place in the squad.

Notably, India T20I captain Hardik Pandya was injured in the World Cup 2023 and isn't expected to be fit for the T20I and ODI series in South Africa as well. The likes of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Ravindra Jadeja have not played a single T20I match after the T20 World Cup 2022.

The second, third, fourth and fifth T20Is will be played on November 26 (Thiruvananthapuram), November 28 (Guwahati), December 1 (Raipur) and December 3 (Bengaluru) respectively.

India’s squad Squad for T20I series vs Australia: Suryakumar Yadav (Captain), Ruturaj Gaikwad (vice-captain), Ishan Kishan, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Tilak Varma, Rinku Singh, Jitesh Sharma (wk), Washington Sundar, Axar Patel, Shivam Dubey, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna, Avesh Khan, Mukesh Kumar