Deepak Chahar has made a comeback with the Indian team after nearly six months of treatment for a back injury ahead of the ODI series in Zimbabwe in August. Rahul Tripathi has been given a first ODI call-up, while Washington Sundar and Kuldeep Yadav have been included in the roster of 15 for the three-game series in Harare.
KL Rahul has not yet recovered sufficiently after undergoing successful surgery for a sports hernia and then suffering a Covid-19 attack. Rahul took to his social media to say his recovery after surgery had put him on track for the white-ball games against the West Indies, but the Covid infection has pushed his progress back to full fitness by a few weeks.
Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Arshdeep Singh and Yuzvendra Chahal, who were all part of the ODIs in the West Indies, have been excluded. While there has been no official word on the rosters or non-squads, it is clear that key players will be rotated as part of the BCCI’s policy, keeping in mind the overcrowded international calendar. India is currently playing a white-ball series in the West Indies and the Asian Cup kicks off in the UAE on August 27, just five days after the last ODI in Zimbabwe.
Chahar last played at a representative level in the T20I series at home to the West Indies in February. He sustained the back injury while rehab at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru, where he was recovering from the quadricep tear he suffered during the West Indian Games. He then sat out of the IPL, where he was the biggest purchase of Chennai Super Kings in the 2022 auction, as well as all international cricket India has played since.
Kuldeep recently received the green signal from the NCA’s medical team after recovering from a hairline fracture in his right wrist, which had forced him to leave the South African T20Is at home, as well as the white-ball tours of Ireland and England. He is on the squad currently playing in the T20I series in the West Indies. Kuldeep last played in the IPL for Delhi Capitals, taking 21 wickets in 14 matches.
Washington, who last played for India in the ODIs against the West Indies, had recovered from a hand injury last month and most recently played for Lancashire in the County Championship. He took a five-for in the first innings against Northamptonshire in his first county game, then followed it up with a match-winning knockout of 34*. He played one more game, against Kent, and took 3 for 24 in the second innings.
Tripathi had received his first call-up to India for the T20Is against Ireland in June, but failed to make the playing XI. While he has made a name for himself for his exploits in T20s, particularly in the IPL, Tripathi also has a pretty good track record in the 50-over format: in 43 List A games, he has 1209 runs at an average of 31, 00. In the 2021 Vijay Hazare Trophy, he scored 199 runs in five matches at 49.75.
Shikhar Dhawan, who led India in the West Indian ODIs, will also remain captain for this series, while regular captain Rohit Sharma will remain seated. The likes of Virat Kohli, Hardik Pandya, Jasprit Bumrah, Rishabh Pant and Mohammed Shami are also outfitted.