Cricket South Africa declares their ODI squad for India series

South Africa cricket board has decided to welcome back former skipper Faf du Plessis for the ODI series against India commencing from March 12. Du Plessis will be playing an ODI match after a long break, the last he played was in the World Cup 2019.  There were rumors regarding his future when he was dropped for the England tour, as Quinton De Kock continued to lead the team after du Plessis duly resigned from the captaincy across all formats ahead of the Australia T20Is.

South Africa is currently having a three-match ODI series at home against Australia. They are leading the series after the opening game courtesy a maiden century from Heinrich Klaasen which helped them to get a score of 291 batting first at Boland Park. The squad playing against Australia is largely the same except for a few changes.

Janneman Malan who clinched off a golden duck on his ODI debut has made way for Faf du Plessis in the squad. Meanwhile, the spinner Tabraiz Shamsi is likely to miss the series as he and his Khadija are expecting their first child during the tour according to Sport24.

On the other hand, George Linde has been given an opportunity while replacing Shamsi hence gets to make his ODI debut. Linde was one of the players who shone last year in India. He had scored 64 runs across two innings in the only Test he played and picked four wickets in the match as well with his left-arm spin.

He has been quite decent in the ongoing domestic One-Day Cup where he scored 159 in seven innings at a strike-rate of 116.91 and an average of almost 32 playing for Cape Cobras. He has also scalped seven wickets conceding runs at an economy of 5.71. Another prominent player missing from the squad is Kagiso Rabada who has been ruled out of the series due to a groin strain.

“It is exciting to see the amount of competition for spots that we have within the team and in the franchises, it’s a good headache for us as selectors to have. We are satisfied with our picks for what will certainly be a challenging tour of India.

“We saw some promising performances last year from the T20 squad that traveled there and we wanted to give a player like George Linde another crack at the conditions which seemed to really suit him.”

“We are also particularly pleased with the balance of youth and experience that we have achieved while our young leadership group continues to establish itself. We are looking forward to some good performances in this relatively short tour,” the selector Linda Zondi said.

South Africa ODI squad for India ODIs: Quinton de Kock (captain), Temba Bavuma, Rassie van der Dussen, Faf du Plessis, Kyle Verreynne, Heinrich Klaasen, David Miller, Jon-Jon Smuts, Andile Phehlukwayo, Lungi Ngidi, Lutho Sipamla, Beuran Hendricks, Anrich Nortje, George Linde, Keshav Maharaj.