Viru, Yuvi, Gauti, Zak get lifeline

Visakhapatnam: Out-of-favour players Virender Sehwag, Zaheer Khan and Gautam Gambhir were on Tuesday handed a lifeline for staging a comeback to the national team as they were included in the India 'A' squad for two four-day games against visiting West Indies 'A' next month.

Yuvraj Singh, another player who find himself on the sidelines, was also given an opportunity to force his way back into the ODI team after being named captain for the three-match unofficial series and lone T20 match against West Indies 'A' beginning September 15.

The squads were named by the BCCI senior selection panel which met here on Tuesday. All the four players have been out of the Indian team since early this year. They will play under Cheteshwar Pujara in the second and third four-day games at Shimoga (October 2-5) and Hubli (October 9-12), the Cricket Board said in a media release.

The Squads: India 'A' squad for three One-Day Games and T20 games against West Indies 'A': Yuvraj Singh (captain), Unmukt Chand, Robin Uthappa, Baba Aparajith, Kedar Jadhav, Naman Ojha (wk), Yusuf Pathan, Irfan Pathan, Jaydev Unadkat, Praveen Kumar, Sumit Narwal, Shahbaz Nadeem, Mandeep Singh, Rahul Sharma. First four-day match against West Indies 'A': Cheteshwar Pujara (captain), Jiwanjot Singh, K L Rahul, Manpreet Juneja, Rajat Paliwal, Harshad Khadiwale, Parvez Rasool, Bhargav Bhatt, Ishwar Chand Pandey, Mohammed Shami, Ashoke Dinda, Rohit Motwani, Dhawal Kulkarni (wk), Paras Dogra.

Second and third four-day match against West Indies 'A': Cheteshwar Pujara (captain), Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag, Sheldon Jackson, Abhishek Nayar, Paras Dogra, Uday Kaul (wk), Parvez Rasool, Bhargav Bhatt. Dhawal Kulkarni, Zaheer Khan, Ishwar Chand Pandey, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Kaif.

India Red Squad for the NKP Salve Challenger Trophy: Irfan Pathan (captain), Robin Uthappa, Abhinav Mukund, Sourabh Tiwary, Gurkirat Mann, Kedar Jadhav, Smit Patel (wk), Yusuf Pathan, Shahbaz Nadeem, Abhimanyu Mithun, Umesh Yadav Suraj Yadav.

India Blue: Yuvraj Singh (captain), Akshath Reddy, Naman Ojha (wk), Mandeep Singh, Ankit Bawane, Abhishek Nayar, Manish Pandey, Piyush Chawla, Ankit Rajpoot, Vinay Kumar, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Iresh Saxena.