India vs South Africa: BCCI announces schedule for five-match T20I series

The
Indian cricket board (BCCI) on Wednesday evening announced the venues and
schedule for India’s five-match T20I series against South Africa. The series,
which is part of India’s preparations for the upcoming ICC T20 World Cup in
Australia to be held in October-November, will be played after the conclusion
of the Indian Premier League 2022 (IPL). The matches of the T20I series will be held
in Chennai, Bengaluru, Nagpur, Rajkot and Delhi.

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According
to the BCCI website, the first match of the series will be played in Chennai on
June 9. The second, third and fourth T20I will be held on June 12 (Bengaluru),
June 14 (Nagpur) and June 17 (Nagpur). The series finale will be played at
Delhi’s Arun Jaitley Stadium on June 19.

The
series will provide good opportunities to both sides to fix their issues before
the T20 World Cup in Australia. 

India
recently registered back to back 3-0 clean sweeps against West Indies and Sri
Lanka. Riding on these two one-sided T20I series wins, India attained the one
number ranking in the ICC T20I rankings with 270 rating points from 42 matches.
The Indian team is followed by England and Pakistan while New Zealand and South
Africa are occupying the fourth and fifth spots.  

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In the series against West Indies, Suyrakumar Yadav was adjudged Player of the Series for scoring 104 runs in three matches. In the Sri Lanka series, Shreyas Iyer received the award for scoring 204 runs in as many matches with the help of three unbeaten half-centuries. 

Abbey
Kuruvilla gets new role

Meanwhile,
former India pacer Abbey Kuruvilla, who was appointed senior national selector
last year, resigned from his post and has been appointed the new General
Manager (Cricket Operations), a post vacated by Dhiraj Malhotra. Malhotra
stepped down a couple of months back to rejoin Delhi Capitals.

Kuruvilla,
who was responsible for West Zone, had to resign as the constitution states any
national selector (junior or senior) cannot hold the post for more than five
years cumulatively.

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While
appointing Kuruvilla, it was not taken into account that he had completed four
years as chairman of the junior national selection committee, so all he had was
one year.