Spinners Ashwin, Jadeja rested for England T20s
mumbai — India have rested leading spinners Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja for the three-match Twenty20 international series against England, the country’s cricket board said on Monday.
Off-spinner Ashwin and leftarm colleague Jadeja played all five tests against England, leading the hosts to a 4-0 victory in the rubber. They also led India’s spin attack in their 2-1 victory in the three-match one-day international series.
Leg-spinner Amit Mishra and off-break bowler Parvez Rasool have replaced the duo in the 15-man squad, led by Virat Kohli, for the series, starting with the first match at Kanpur on Thursday.
Meanwhile, he has come as a replacement of country’s top spinner Ravichandran Ashwin but Parvez Rasool’s urge is to find a place for himself in the Indian dressing room when the world’s No. 1 off-spinner is around.
“I had no clue that Ashwin has been rested for the series. Actually, when I got a call from the BCCI office, I thought this will be a first chance for me to share the dressing room with Ashwin. Seven days with a player of his calibre means I can learn a lot,” Rasool, first player from Kashmir valley to play for India, told PTI.
“I was training with state team in Jammu for the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. I got a call from BCCI office in the morning and now I am rushing to catch a flight to Delhi,” he said.
While in pecking order, Rasool comes behind Ashwin and Jayant Yadav, his own assessment is that he has become a better bowler than when he played his lone ODI against Bangladesh back in Dhaka in 2014. “This year before the Ranji Trophy, there was an NCA camp for spinners only. There I had sessions with Narendra Hirwani and Nikhil Chopra. I believe those 20 days at NCA were very fruitful. I dissected my own bowling.” — Agencies
Indian T20 team
Virat Kohli (captain), Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Lokesh Rahul, Mandeep Singh, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina, Rishabh Pant, Hardik Pandya, Amit Mishra, Parvez Rasool, Yuzvendra Chahal, Manish Pandey, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Ashish Nehra