Naman Ojha to lead India A Down Under

New Delhi, June 25 (IANS) Promising wicketkeeper-batsman Naman Ojha was on Saturday named skipper of the India A squad for the two four-day matches against Australia A and the quadrangular series involving South Africa A, Australia A and Cricket Australia's National Performance Squad (NPS).

The senior selection committee, which met earlier in the day, picked as many as nine players out of 15 from the victorious squad which recently mauled Zimbabwe both in the One-Day International (ODI) and T20 International series.

The Rahul Dravid-coached side will play both the four-day ties against the hosts at the Allan Border field in Brisbane from September 8 to 11 and 15 to 18 while the Harrup Park will host the finals of the one-day leg of the tournament at Mackay.

The quadrangular series kicks off with South Africa A taking on NPS on August 13 at Tony Ireland stadium in Townsville, while India A will open its campaign against Australia A on August 14 at the same venue.

India A will then take on the Proteas on August 17 before locking horns with NPS on August 21 in Townsville.

The action will then shift to Mackay where the Indians face South Africa A on August 25 before taking on NPS and Australia A on August 27 and 30 respectively. The finals are slated for September 3 and 4, which will be played between the third and fourth-placed teams while the top two clash each other in the other game.

Team:

India A: Naman Ojha (captain and wk), Faiz Fazal, Akhil Herwadkar, Shreyas Iyer, Karun Nair, Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav (wk), Vijay Shankar, Axar Patel, Jayant Yadav, Dhawal Kulkarni, Jaydev Unadkat, Barinder Sran, Shahbaz Nadeem, Sanju Samson. Coach - Rahul Dravid

--IANS

tri/vm