NEW DELHI, Nov 19: Lakshmipathy Balaji has replaced injured paceman Aavishkar Salvi in a 16-man Test squad for India’s tour of Australia starting later this month.

Salvi, uncapped in Test cricket, sprained his shoulder while bowling in the one-day triangular series final against Australia in Kolkata on Tuesday and will be out of action for three weeks.

“Balaji is a fast bowler too, so we asked him to step in,” Karunakaran Nair, secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), told reporters on Wednesday.

The 22-year-old Balaji played well on his debut in the drawn two-Test series against New Zealand last month but was surprisingly omitted for the Australian tour.

Salvi bowled only three overs in Kolkata, giving away 23 runs without picking up a wicket. Australia won the match by 37 runs.

India will play four Tests in Australia, in Brisbane (Dec 4-8), Adelaide (Dec 12-16), Melbourne (Dec 26-30) and Sydney (Jan 2-6). The matches will be followed by a one-day tri-series also involving Zimbabwe.

Test squad: Saurav Ganguly (captain), Akash Chopra, Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Vangipurappu Laxman, Sadagopan Ramesh, Parthiv Patel (wicketkeeper), Harbhajan Singh, Anil Kumble, Zaheer Khan, Ashish Nehra, Ajit Agarkar, Lakshmipathy Balaji, Irfan Pathan, Deep Dasgupta (wicketkeeper). —Reuters