MUMBAI: India axed struggling opener K.L. Rahul and handed Rohit Sharma a chance to revive his stop-start Test career after selecting the limited-overs stalwart for next month’s three-match series against South Africa.

Rahul has gone 12 Test innings without a 50-plus score and struggled in the recent tour of West Indies where India won both the matches to top the World Test Championship table.

Former captain Sourav Ganguly was among those who felt Sharma, who smashed a record five hundreds at the 50-overs World Cup in England and finished as the tournament’s top scorer, should partner Mayank Agarwal at the top of the order.

“We want to give Rohit Sharma an opportunity to open the innings in Tests,” chief selector M.S.K. Prasad said after naming the 15-member squad in Mumbai on Thursday.

Prithvi Shaw would have been Agarwal’s automatic partner but the 19-year-old is currently serving a doping ban.

The only player in the world with three double hundreds in One-day Internationals, Sharma averages nearly 40 in Tests batting in the middle order.

The 32-year-old has struggled to replicate his limited-overs heroics in the 27 Tests he has played so far and must reinvent himself as an opener in the long form as well.

Punjab top order batsman Shubman Gill got his maiden Test call-up, while the selectors opted for two wicket-keepers in Rishabh Pant and Wriddhiman Saha.

The three-Test series follows three Twenty20 Internationals which start in Dharamsala on Sunday.

Squad: Virat Kohli (captain), Mayank Agarwal, Rohit Sharma, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Hanuma Vihari, Rishabh Pant, Wriddhiman Saha, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Ishant Sharma, Shubman Gill.

Published in Dawn, September 13th, 2019