Ind vs SA: Raina recalled for T20 series

The dynamic left-hander last played a T20I against England in February 2017.

Raina made a strong case for himself with a blistering innings of 126 runs against Bengal in the recently concluded Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 tournament.

Suresh Raina has been recalled for the three-match Twenty20 series against South Africa.  The Uttar Pradesh left hander who had played his last match against England at Bangalore on February 1, 2017, did not feature in the next ten Twenty20 matches for India against the West Indies (Kingston), Sri Lanka (Colombo), Australia (Ranchi, Guwahati), New Zealand (Delhi, Rajkot, Thiruvananthapuram) and Sri Lanka (Cuttack, Indore, Wankhede). Retained by the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) for the IPL-11 season, Raina scored 314 runs in nine innings in the recent Syed Mushtaq Ali Twenty20 tournament. Virat Kohli, who took a break after the Test series against Sri Lanka, has returned to India’s Twenty20 scheme of  things. He will also lead the team in the six-match ODI series in South Africa. Dropped from the national squad that was picked for the three-match Twenty20 series Sri Lanka last December are Shreyas Iyer, Washington Sundar, Mohammed Siraj, Basil Thampi and Deepak Hooda.

India squad for T20I series vs SA: Virat Kohli (Captain), Rohit Sharma (vc), Shikhar Dhawan, K. L. Rahul, Suresh Raina, M. S. Dhoni (wk), Dinesh Karthik, Hardik Pandya, Manish Pandey, Axar Patel, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah, Jaydev Unadkat, Shardul Thakur.