Abhimanyu Easwaran, Harshit Rana, Nitish Reddy picked for Australia Tests

The Ajit Agarkar-led selection panel have picked Abhimanyu Easwaran, Harshit Rana, and Nitish Reddy for the Australia Tests. Indian spinner Kuldeep Yadav misses out on the squad as he has been referred to The BCCI Centre of Excellence after the ongoing Test series against New Zealand.

Abhimanyu Easwaran has been added to the squad as a third opener after consistent performances in the domestic circuit for Bengal. 

Meanwhile, Mohammed Shami has been left out of the squad as he is yet to achieve full fitness from his injury. Shami will be a big miss for India as he has all the experience under his belt. 

Jasprit Bumrah will lead the seam attack and he will have the company of Mohammed Siraj and Akash Deep as the second and third seamer. Prasidh Krishna and Harshit Rana, who both are hit-the-deck bowlers, have been added to the Test squad. Nitish Kumar Reddy, who made an impressive T20I debut against Bangladesh, has been picked as a seam-bowling all-rounder.

Washington Sundar, who came up with a fine all-round performance in the historic Brisbane Test against Australia, has been picked ahead of Axar Patel. Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja will continue to be the two lead spinners of the team.

The pace trio of Mukesh Kumar, Navdeep Saini, and Khaleel Ahmed have been picked as the traveling reserves.

The opening Test match between India and Australia will be played at Perth from November 22 onwards.

India squad: Rohit Sharma (C), Jasprit Bumrah (VC), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, Rishabh Pant (WK), Sarfaraz Khan, Dhruv Jurel (WK), R Ashwin, R Jadeja, Mohd. Siraj, Akash Deep, Prasidh Krishna, Harshit Rana, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Washington Sundar

Reserves: Mukesh Kumar, Navdeep Saini, Khaleel Ahmed