No MS Dhoni, Mohammed Shami but an uncapped finds place in Scott Styris’ India T20 World Cup squad
Former New Zealand all-rounder Scott Styris picked his 15-member India squad for the T20 World Cup in Australia in October this year. MS Dhoni, Mohammed Shami, Bhuvneshwar Kumar were the notable omissions from Styris’ squad.
The focus has firmly shifted to the shortest format of cricket with the first T20I series of the year between India and Sri Lanka setting the tone for the T20 World Cup in Australia later this year. There is still a fair amount of time left before the mega event kickstarts in October but that hasn’t stopped former cricketers and experts from expressing their views about the type of squad the top teams should go in with. Like always India are the cynosure of all eyes as speculations about their squad have already started to gather momentum. After former India batsman VVS Laxman named a rather predictable India squad for the World Cup, former New Zealand all-rounder and now a famous commentator, Scott Styris too decided to pick his 15-member India for the T20 World Cup.
Unlike Laxman’s however, Styris’ India squad has quite a few surprises. The former New Zealander went in with a similar squad that India is playing with against Sri Lanka barring the surprise inclusion of young batsman Shubman Gill in place of the seasoned Manish Pandey.
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Gill, interestingly, is yet to make his T20I debut and has been in the news in the past week or so for all the wrong reasons. He had an ugly fall out with the on-field umpire after he was given out in a Ranji Trophy game against Delhi at Mohali. His antics, in fact, forced the umpire to change his decision, which did not go down well with the Delhi players and the match was halted for about 15 minutes. Gill was docked 100% match fees for his conduct in that match.
The Punjab right-hander, however, has shown that he has all the skills to shine at the top level. In the limited opportunities he got at the top of the order for KKR in the last IPL, he made no harm to his reputation by scoring consistently at a brisk pace.
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Apart from Gil, the other surprising inclusion in Styris’ squad is Sanju Samson. While the Kerala batsman has been a part of the India T20I squad in the last few series but he is yet to get a game ever since his debut T20 game in Zimbabwe back in 2015.
The surprises don’t end there. There was no place for either Bhuvneshwar Kumar or Mohammed Shami in Styris’ World Cup squad. The Kiwi all-rounder went in with Jasprit Bumrah, Navdeep Saini and Deepak Chahar as his seam-bowling options while sticking to the tried and tested spin options of Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, and Ravindra Jadeja.
There was, however, no place for young all-rounder Washington Sundar.
India are currently busy playing a three-match T20I series against Sri Lanka, in which the Virat Kohli-led side has taken a 1-0 lead after the first match was a washout. The two sides will lock horns in the 3rd T20I at Pune on Friday.
Scott Styris India T20 World Cup squad: Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Virat Kohli (C), Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant, Hardik Pandya, Shikhar Dhawan, Shubman Gill, Sanju Samson, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Jasprit Bumrah, Navdeep Saini, Deepak Chahar
