Hanuma Vihari added to India A squad for South Africa tour

The selection committee has added Hyderabad batter Hanuma Vihari to India A squad for the South Africa tour that was announced a few days ago. This development comes only a few hours after India’s squad for the upcoming two-match Test series against New Zealand was announced and Vihari didn’t find a place in it. Several reports were doing the rounds then stating that he was dropped from the side.

However, another report suggested that Vihari would be picked in India A squad to play three four-day matches in Bloemfontein later this month. India A squad is filled with a lot of India hopefuls and a good performance on this tour may well give them a ticket to the senior team’s South Africa tour starting from December 17 with a three-match Test series.

As for Vihari, there has been no communication from the selectors and it remains to be seen if he gets picked for India’s tour to the rainbow nation next month. Uncapped batter Shreyas Iyer made it to the Test squad ahead of him for the New Zealand series earlier in the day.

Vihari has not played for India since SCG Test

The exclusion of Hanuma Vihari from the India squad seems a bit unfair on him. The man had played a steely knock for India in the SCG Test on the Australia tour to draw the game despite being injured. He hasn’t played for India since then. He was expected to be an automatic pick for the New Zealand Test after regaining fitness but that hasn’t been the case.

This might also be the plan of the management to get played accustomed to the conditions in South Africa as the likes of Prithvi Shaw and Abhimanyu Easwaran who travelled with the team on England tour have also been picked in the A squad. Vihari has been sort of an overseas specialist for India playing all his 12 Tests away from home and has fared decently scoring more than 600 runs at an average of close to 33.

Updated India A squad: Priyank Panchal (Captain), Prithvi Shaw, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Devdutt Padikkal, Sarfaraz Khan, Baba Aparajith, Upendra Yadav (wicket-keeper), K Gowtham, Rahul Chahar, Saurabh Kumar, Navdeep Saini, Umran Malik, Ishan Porel, Arzan Nagwaswalla