4 players who need to perform in the Asia Cup for staying in contention for Indian squad
The Board of Control for Cricket in India announced a 16-member squad for Asia Cup on Saturday.
The selection committee headed by MSK Prasad decided to rest the regular captain Virat Kohli as he has been playing non-stop cricket for a long time.
Mumbai batsman, Rohit Sharma has been given the charge to lead the side while the left-handed opener, Shikar Dhawan set as his vice.
There are few new faces in the squad while most have been part of India's ODI side from quite some time. Among them, some players haven't performed to their potential and might be axed from the squad if they didn't prove themselves in Asia Cup. In this slide, we have marked four of them:
#4 Axar Patel
The Gujrati cricketer, Axar Patel has been in and out of the India squad in ODIs as earlier Ravindra Jadeja was a regular member of the team.
Apart from his left-arm orthodox bowling, the 24 years old, Axar can bat down the order as well. Owning 45 wickets and 181 runs in 38 ODIs, Patel has last played an ODI for India in November 2017.
Following his recent domestic performances, he has been included in India's Asia Cup squad as a third spinner. With a lot of spinners doing well at multiple levels, it would be probably the last chance for Axar to prove himself in ODI cricket.
#3 Dinesh Karthik
Wicket-keeper batsman, Dinesh Karthik has been named as the second wicket-keeper in the squad apart from MS Dhoni.
Karthik made his ODI debut way back in 2004 against England but has played just 80 ODIs so far. Dhoni's entry to India side blocked the way for many wicket-keeper's of the country including Karthik as well.
Though, the Madrasi cricketer didn't give up as he kept knocking the doors till he made a comeback in July 2017.
However, he hasn't done too well in the few chances he has been provided with. He averages 29 in ODI cricket and the upcoming Asia Cup would probably be do-or-die for him, with few young wicket-keeper's waiting in the line.