Krishnamurthy to lead India A on the tour of Australia

Veda Krishnamurthy will lead a 15-member India A squad for the tour of Australia in December. Krishnamurthy, who hit an undefeated 57 in the final T20I against West Indies, will have Anuja Patil as her deputy in the squad, that also has the teenager Shafali Verma.

In the just-concluded T20I series against West Indies, Shafali finished as the highest run-getter with 158 runs, including two fifty-plus scores. Patil also was among the wickets in the series, picking up five of them in the three matches that she played. She replaced Shikha Pandey in those games and like the seamer did, she provided early breakthroughs with her off-spin.

Apart from the trio, Priya Punia, Dayalan Hemalatha, Sushma Verma, Mansi Joshi and Arundhati Reddy are the others who were on the Caribbean tour in either formats. Hemalatha and Sushma (both ODIs) and Reddy (T20Is) were the only ones who didn’t play a single match.

Devika Vaidya and Tanuja Kanwer, both of whom were in form in the ACC Women’s Emerging Asia Cup, were also given a berth for the tour. The former was the captain of India Emerging in the tourney and picked up a four-fer in the final. Kanwer, too, picked up four for 15 in the final to help India Emerging defend a low total against Sri Lanka Emerging.

Sushma who scored an unbeaten 40 in the final of the Women's T20 Challenge in May, has been awarded a berth to audition for a back-up wicket-keeper’s slot.

She will have to compete for a spot in the XI

with Nuzhat Parween, who remained unbeaten on two of the three innings she played

in the domestic tourney, apart from being among the runs in the Emerging Asia

Cup, also finds a spot in the squad.

Tanusree Sarkar, Renuka Singh and Manali Dakshini are also a part of the A squad that will play three 50-over games and three T20s against Australia A, which could be the final opportunity to audition for places before the T20 World Cup early next year in Australia.

Originally in the squad, Harleen Deol, the India allrounder, suffered a toe injury during the training camp ahead of the team's departure to Australia. She has been replaced by Yastika Bhatia, the left-hand batter from Baroda, who was part of India's triumphant Emerging team.

Squad: Veda Krishnamurthy (c), Anuja Patil (vc), Priya Punia, Shafali Verma, Devika Vaidya, D Hemalatha, Tanusree Sarkar, Sushma Verma (wk), Nuzhat Parween (wk), Mansi Joshi, Arundhati Reddy, Renuka Singh, Manali Dakshini, T P Kanwar, Yastika Bhatia.