India vs Australia: Yuzvendra Chahal reacts to selection snub after India announce T20I squad

India announced their T20I squad for a 5-match T20I series against Australia which starts 4 days after the Cricket World Cup 2023 final. Suryakumar Yadav was named as the captain of the side as the Ajit Agarkar-led selection panel picked a 15-man squad without making a lot of wholesale changes to the the squads that played the format before the World Cup. 

Hardik Pandya, who had been captaining the T20I side since the start of the year, missed out due to the injury he picked up during the World Cup. Ruturaj Gaikwad, who led India to the Asian Games Gold medal in men's cricket, was named as the vice-captain was the first three T20Is while Shreyas Iyer is set to join the squad as the deputy to Suryakumar for the last 2 T20Is. 

While most of the players who were part of the World Cup 2023 squad, barring Ishan Kishan, Prasidh Krishna and Suryakumar, were rested for the T20I series, Sanju Samson and Yuzvendra Chahal were among the notable omissions.

Leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal last T20Is for India during their tour of the West Indies in August. The senior spinner took to social media to post a cryptic message after his name was missing in the T20I squad for the West Indies series. 

Chahal was overlooked for the World Cup as well and the leg-spinner last played an ODI in January 2023. He was part of the squad in the West Indies but did not get a game as the selectors and the team management preferred Kuldeep Yadav for the wrist-spinner role along with finger spinners Ravindra Jadeja and R Ashwin. 

For the T20I series against Australia, India have brought back left-arm spinner Axar Patel after he missed the World Cup due to injury. Leg-break bowler Ravi Bishnoi and off-spinner Washington Sundar were the other two spinners in the squad. 

Chahal made use of the time away from the senior national team, playing red-ball cricket in County Championship for Kent in September. He also turned up for Haryana in the recently-concluded Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy T20, picking up 11 wickets in 7 matches. 

Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who picked up 16 wickets in 7 matches for Uttar Pradesh in an impressive campaign, was also overlooked for the T20Is. 

SQUAD

Suryakumar Yadav (Captain), Ruturaj Gaikwad (vice-captain), Ishan Kishan, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Tilak Varma, Rinku Singh, Jitesh Sharma (wk), Washington Sundar, Axar Patel, Shivam Dubey, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna, Avesh Khan, Mukesh Kumar

IND vs AUS, T20I Schedule

1st T20I on November 23 in Visakhapatnam

2nd T20I on November 26 in Thiruvananthapuram 

3rd T20I on November 28 in Guwahati 

4th T20I on December 1 in Raipur

5th T20I on December 3 in Bengaluru