Abhinav Mukund Ruled Out Of Duleep Trophy Opener

Abhinav Mukund, the skipper of India Red has been ruled out of the first game of Duleep Trophy due to viral fever. The Under 19 ODI skipper Prithvi Shaw has replaced the left handed in the side. In Mukund’s absence, his statemate Dinesh Karthik will lead the India Red team. There is one more change in the side as Dhawal Kulkarni has also been ruled out and has been replaced by Varun Aaron, who surprisingly missed out the cut in the original squad.

Mukund’s availability has come out as a sweet headache for Karthik as with Shaw’s inclusion in the side, it will make selecting playing XI a bit difficult for him. Sudip Chatterjee and Priyank Panchal, both were part of India A side for South Africa A unofficial Test matches but latter was ruled out due to fever. Panchal, the highest run-scorer of 2016/17 Ranji Trophy season, is expected to leave behind Shaw to open the innings with Chatterjee.

The India Red side will face Parthiv Patel led India Green in the first match of second edition of Pink ball Duleep Trophy in Lucknow. There is one change in India Green as well as Parvez Rasool is not available for the game. No replacement has been named for him as of yet.
In this camp as well, the unavailability of Rasool has opened the doors for Krishnappa Gowtham. Though he has a competition with Mayank Dagar but being an all-rounder, Gowtham is expected to make it to the playing XI for the first game.

India Green squad:
Murali Vijay, Ravikumar Samarth, Prashant Chopra, Shreyas Iyer, Karun Nair, Ankit Bawne, Parthiv Patel(c), Shahbaz Nadeem, Parvez Rasool, Navdeep Saini, Mohammed Siraj, Siddarth Kaul, Mayank Dagar, Nitin Saini, Aniket Choudhary

India Red squad:
Abhinav Mukund(c), Priyank Panchal, Sudip Chatterjee, Ishank Jaggi, Ambati Rayudu, Dinesh Karthik, Rishabh Pant, Baba Indrajith, Krishnappa Gowtham, Karn Sharma, Basil Thampi, Dhawal Kulkarni, Ashok Dinda, Chama Milind