Hardik Pandya hints at few players making their debut for India in the upcoming INDvIRE series
Our regular captain Rohit Sharma being in England for the one-off red-ball match against the English, the captaincy crown for the T20I series against Ireland has been extended to Hardik Pandya. Hardik’s captaincy skills were in the talks since he won the IPL for his new franchise Gujarat Titans and its time that he leads the Indian team in Rohit’s absence. The 2 match T20I series against Ireland starts tomorrow. Hardik was attending a press conference today wherein he said that “a few caps might be given for tomorrow’s match” and hinted a few players might be making their India debut.
India’s T20I squad for Ireland:
With the senior players being unavailable for this series, the BCCI included many young guns in the squad who were well deserving and had been justifying since long enough as to why they should get their maiden call-up. The squad announced for this series is-
Hardik Pandya (c), Bhuvaneshwar Kumar (vice-captain), Ishan Kishan, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Sanju Samson, Surya Kumar Yadav, Venkatesh Iyer, Deepak Hooda, Rahul Tripathi, Dinesh Karthik (wicket keeper), Yuzavendra Chahal, Axar Patel, Harshal Patel, Ravi Bishnoi, Avesh Khan, Arshdeep Singh, Umran Malik.
In the recent series against the Proteas, the then captain Rishab Pant chose to stick to the same combinations even after facing defeats in the first two matches. In the press conference being conducted 24 hours before the game, Hardik said that, “We want to give opportunity to people but want to play our best XI as well. There will be situation where there will be a couple of caps given but more than anything, it’s about making sure that we have the best XI” which could mean that Umran Malik and Rahul Tripathi could make their debut after being consistent and giving stellar performances for their franchises in the Indian Premier League and being hailed by the greats of the game.
All the eyes would be on Hardik Pandya who himself is making a comeback into the team and now that he gets to lead the team, his performance would be under scrutiny itself.
India begin their two-match series on Sunday, 26 June at 9PM.
