KL Rahul to lead India A in second four-day game against England Lions

After comprehensively winning the five-match unofficial One Day series by a margin of 4-1, India A are currently locking horns with England Lions in the first of the two-match unofficial Test series. The opening game is currently taking place at the Krishnagiri Stadium, Wayanad in Kerala. The 26-year-old all-rounder in Ankit Bawne is in charge of the team.

In the meantime, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has announced the squad for the last and second encounter, which is scheduled to get underway on Wednesday, February 13 at the Srikantadatta Narasimha Raja Wadiyar Ground, Mysore. The most crucial development comes in the form of the fact that KL Rahul has been named as the captain.

Karun Nair roped in

Rahul hasn’t had the best of times of late in his cricketing career. He was dropped from the New Zealand tour after a string of failures. The Karnataka batsman also flattered to deceive in the limited-overs series against the Lions. However, Ravi Shastri, the Indian head coach, recently said that Rahul coming back to form is a matter of time. He is currently playing the first unofficial Test as a normal player.

The selectors have also decided to draft in Karun Nair in place of fast bowler Avesh Khan. Nair made his comeback into the Test squad in the one-off Test against Afghanistan in June last year and was also there during the five-match series against England in August and September.

However, he didn’t get to play even a single match even as the likes of Hanuma Vihari and Rishabh Pant made their debut. He was thereafter left out of the team and it still remains to be a surprise why he couldn’t break into the playing eleven despite some lascklustre Indian batting performance.

Here’s the squad

KL Rahul (Captain), A Easwaran, Priyank Panchal, A Bawne, Karun Nair, Ricky Bhui, Siddhesh Lad, KS Bharat (wk), Shahbaz Nadeem, Jalaj Saxena, Mayank Markande, Shardul Thakur, Navdeep Saini, Varun Aaron

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