After the Guwahati Test between India and South Africa, a 3-match ODI series will be played from November 30 and then a five-match T20 series will be played from December 9. A 15-member squad has been announced recently for the ODI series. The squad for the T20 series will be announced soon. It is believed that Rishabh Pant may return to this shortest format of cricket.
Rishabh Pant to play in T20I?
Sanju Samson was part of the Indian T20 team on the tour of Australia. He was included in the playing XI for the first T20I, but the match was washed out due to rain, preventing him from batting. He was then unexpectedly promoted to No. 3 in the second match, scoring just two runs, and unfortunately, India lost that match. India won the next two matches of the series 2-1, but Sanju Samson was not included in the playing XI for the remaining three matches.
Following Sanju Samson’s omission from the Australia tour, there are speculations that he could be dropped from the team’s T20 World Cup 2026 plans. He has been unable to find a place in the top order and is now also missing opportunities in the middle order. His T20 statistics are impressive. He is the only Indian batsman to have scored three centuries in this format .
Meanwhile, regarding Rishabh Pant’s T20 record, he has scored 1209 runs in 66 innings of 76 T20 matches for India so far, at an average of 23.25 and a strike rate of 127.40. He has scored three half-centuries during this period. It is believed that the team management may select Pant as the primary wicketkeeper-batsman and include Jitesh Sharma as an additional wicketkeeper-batsman.
Probable Indian team for the upcoming T20 series
The squad for the Indian Premier League (IPL) is as follows: Abhishek Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Suryakumar Yadav (captain), Tilak Verma, Rishabh Pant (wicketkeeper), Shivam Dubey, Axar Patel, Harshit Rana, Kuldeep Yadav, Varun Chakravarthy, Jasprit Bumrah, Rinku Singh, Washington Sundar, Arshdeep Singh, and Jitesh Sharma.