Jasprit Bumrah ruled out; Varun Chakravarthy added to final Champions Trophy squad

India has suffered a huge blow as their gun fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah has been ruled out of the upcoming Champions Trophy. Bumrah suffered a lower back injury in the fifth Test match against Australia at Sydney and could not bowl in the second innings. Bumrah hasn’t yet recovered from the injury and his absence will leave a big void in the team.

Harshit Rana, who made his ODI debut against England at Nagpur, has been added to India’s squad as a replacement for Bumrah. Furthermore, Varun Chakravarthy has been included in the Champions Trophy squad whereas Yashasvi Jaiswal has made way for the mystery spinner in the final squad. Jaiswal has been included in non-traveling reserves along with Shivam Dube and Mohammed Siraj.

Chakravarthy has been in stellar form as he bagged 14 wickets in five T20Is against England at an average of 9.86 and he was awarded Player of the Series. 

The 33-year-old made his ODI debut at Cuttack against England and returned with figures of 1-54 in his quota of 10 overs.

Surprisingly, Mohammed Siraj has not been included in the final squad and Indian selectors have picked five spinners in the squad – Axar Patel, Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, Varun Chakravarthy, and Kuldeep Yadav.

India will kick off their Champions Trophy campaign against Bangladesh at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium, Dubai on February 20.

India squad: Rohit Sharma (Captain), Shubman Gill (Vice-captain), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (WK), Rishabh Pant (WK), Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Harshit Rana, Mohd. Shami, Arshdeep Singh, Ravindra Jadeja, Varun Chakaravarthy