India Playing XI vs South Africa- 1st ODI, South Africa Tour of India 2025
Published - 29 Nov 2025, 06:47 PM | Updated - 29 Nov 2025, 06:53 PM
Table of Contents
India will take on South Africa in the first of the three-match ODI series. This article provides details about India's Playing 11 vs South Africa for the first match of the series.
India Playing XI vs South Africa- 1st ODI, South Africa Tour of India 2025:
Openers: Rohit Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal
The home team would aim to have a good start to the ODI against South Africa, unlike what they got in the recently concluded two-match Test series against the same opposition.
The Men in Blue have been in decent form in ODI cricket in the last couple of years, barring the last series against Australia, which they lost by a margin of two matches to one.
The former ODI World Cup winners would like to take full advantage of their home conditions and maintain their strong record in this format of the game.
The Men in Blue would be without three of their experienced players in the form of captain Shubman Gill, vice captain Shreyas Iyer, and former captain Hardik Pandya, and will be led by KL Rahul, with Yashasvi Jaiswal opening the innings in place of Gill.
Jaiswal will be partnered by Rohit Sharma, who scored a magnificent century in the last ODI match that he played against Australia, and would look to build on it by playing a match-winning knock in the first match.
Both Jaiswal and Rohit will be entrusted to get the team off to a good start in the first ten overs and lay a platform for the middle-order batters to capitalise on.
Middle-order batsmen and all-rounders: Virat Kohli, Ruturaj Gaikwad, KL Rahul (c / wk), Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, Nitish Kumar Reddy,
When it comes to India's middle order, it will also witness a couple of changes to the one that featured in the ODI series against Australia, with Ruturaj Gaikwad and Ravindra Jadeja coming in for Shreyas Iyer and Axar Patel, respectively.
It would be interesting to see how Ruturaj Gaikwad goes about batting at number four, as he is predominantly an opener.
Another noticeable thing in the squad is that the selectors have picked three wicketkeepers for this particular series in Rishabh Pant, KL Rahul, and Dhruv Jurel.
Out of the three, there is a high possibility that only Rahul will play with him, being named as the captain for the series.
India is expected to bat till number eight with three all-rounders, two spin and one fast bowling all-rounder, Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, and Nitish Kumar Reddy taking the number six, seven, and eight spots respectively.
Bowlers: Harshit Rana, Kuldeep Yadav, Arshdeep Singh
As far as the bowling attack is concerned, it will comprise six bowling options, three all-rounders, and three specialist bowlers for the first ODI against South Africa.
Harshit Rana and Arshdeep Singh will take care of India's fast bowling department, with Nitish Kumar Reddy being the third fast bowler.
Experienced spinners Ravindra Jadeja and Kuldeep Yadav will be the two frontline spinners and will be assisted by Washington Sundar
Amidst the number of bowling options available at his disposal, it will be interesting to see how captain KL Rahul manages them.
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