New Delhi: Opener Shikhar Dhawan was on Thursday named captain of the Indian team that will travel to Sri Lanka for a limited-overs tour next month as the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) announced a 20-man squad, packed with youngsters, including six uncapped players.
With the country's top cricketers already in England for the World Test Championship final and the subsequent England series, the selection of a number of youngsters in the squad was on expected lines.
Many of them impressed in the suspended IPL 2021 and have been rewarded with their maiden India call-ups. They include Devdutt Padikkal, Chetan Sakaria, Nitish Rana, Krishnappa Gowtham and Ruturaj Gaikwad.
Prithvi Shaw and Manish Pandey have made a comeback but Shreyas Iyer missed out as he has not yet recovered from his shoulder injury.
Out of favour spin duo of Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal is also part of the squad that also has Pandya brothers -- Hardik and Krunal -- apart from two wicketkeeper-batsmen in young Ishan Kishan and Sanju Samson.
Kerala star Sanju has earned a recall after being dropped from the white-ball squad for the home series against England.
Sandeep Warrier, Ishan Porel, Arshdeep Singh, Sai Kishore and Simarjeet Singh have been named net bowlers.
India are scheduled to clash with Sri Lanka in three One-day Internationals and as many Twenty20 matches on the tour that will begin on July 13 and conclude on July 25. All the matches will be played at the R Premadasa International Cricket Stadium in Colombo.
Indian squad: Shikhar Dhawan (capt), Prithvi Shaw, Devdutt Padikkal, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Suryakumar Yadav, Manish Pandey, Hardik Pandya, Nitish Rana, Ishan Kishan (wk), Sanju Samson (wk), Yuzvendra Chahal, Rahul Chahar, K Gowtham, Krunal Pandya, Kuldeep Yadav, Varun Chakravarthy, Bhuvneshwar Kumar (vice-capt), Deepak Chahar, Navdeep Saini, Chetan Sakariya.
Net bowlers: Ishan Porel, Sandeep Warrier, Arshdeep Singh, Sai Kishore, Simarjeet Singh.
The schedule
1st ODI July 13
2nd ODI July 16
3rd ODI July 18
1st T20I July 21
2nd T20I July 23
3rd T20I July 25