According to an official statement by the Board of Control for Cricket in India, right-arm bowler Jasprit Bumrah was chosen by the senior selection committee on Thursday to captain India in the rescheduled fifth Test match against England at Edgbaston, beginning on Friday (BCCI).
Rishabh Pant, a wicketkeeper-batsman, will replace Bumrah for the much anticipated Test match, according to the statement.
After Rohit Sharma, India's usual captain, tested positive for Covid-19 on the second day of the warm-up match against Leicestershire last week, Bumrah was named captain for the Edgbaston Test. After testing positive for Covid-19, he did not come out to bat in the second innings of the game despite having scored 25 runs in the first.
But because Sharma still has Covid-19, Bumrah, who served as vice-captain when India last played a Test match at home against Sri Lanka in March, will lead the team at Edgbaston starting on Friday. As the first fast bowler to lead India in a Test match since Kapil Dev led India against Pakistan in Bengaluru in March 1987, which also happened to be famous batter Sunil Gavaskar's final Test match, he will now lead India in their 36th Test.
"The Indian cricket team's captain, Mr. Rohit Sharma, will not participate in the fifth Test against England, which will now begin on Friday. On Thursday morning, Rohit had a RAT Test, and the results showed that he had COVID-19. The forthcoming test's skipper will be Jasprit Bumrah, with Rishabh Pant serving as his backup, according to the All-India Senior Selection Committee "the BCCI stated in a statement.
Bumrah's appointment as India's Test captain for the Edgbaston Test means that 2022 will mark the first year in which the national team has had six different captains across all competitions. In addition, he becomes India's sixth prime minister since 2021. In 1959, India competed under the leadership of five different captains: Vinoo Mankad, Hemu Adhikari, Datta Gaekwad, Pankaj Roy, and Gulabrai Ramchand.
With two notable triumphs at Lord's (by 151 runs) and The Oval (by 157 runs) last year, plus a draw at Trent Bridge and a loss by an innings and 76 runs at Headingley, India presently leads the five-match series for the Pataudi Trophy 2-1. The series will be decided in their favour if they win in Edgbaston, marking just the fourth occasion since 1971, 1986, and 2007 that foreign teams have won a Test series in England.
India's Test squad: Jasprit Bumrah (Captain), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Hanuma Vihari, Cheteshwar Pujara, Rishabh Pant (vice-captain) (wicketkeeper), KS Bharat (wicketkeeper), Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin, Shardul Thakur, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, Umesh Yadav, Prasidh Krishna and Mayank Agarwal