South Africa vs Sri Lanka: CSA names squads for the T20I series

After whitewashing Sri Lanka in the five-match ODI series, South Africa are now scheduled to play a three-match T20I series against the Islanders, which starts on Tuesday, March 19. The opening game will be played at the Newlands in Cape Town followed by the second and third T20Is at the SuperSport Park in Centurion and The Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg on March 22 and 24 respectively.

In the meantime, Cricket South Africa (CSA) has named two separate squads for the encounters. Faf du Plessis is the skipper for the first game after which JP Duminy will take over in the next two. Du Plessis and Quinton de Kock have been rested for the last two encounters. The likes of Anrich Nortje, Aiden Markram and Sinethemba Qeshile have also been included.

Even as Nortje and Markram have already played international cricket, Qeshile is yet to get the taste of cricket at the highest level. The management also wanted to include Hashim Amla but he wasn’t available for selection. Amla was a part of the last two ODIs as well, but he had to rule himself out owing to family concerns.

Sinethemba Qeshile has had an outstanding rookie season

“We would have liked to include Hashim Amla but unfortunately he remains unavailable because of his family situation,” Cricket South Africa (CSA) National Selection Panel convener Linda Zondi, was quoted as saying in Cricbuzz.

“Sinethemba Qeshile has had an outstanding rookie season of franchise cricket and is certainly one of the form batsmen in franchise cricket at the moment. He looks a really exciting prospect,” he added. Qeshile recently played for the Warriors in the Domestic One Day Cup and has been pretty impressive with the bat in hand with scores of 88, 121 not out and 54.

Here are the squads

1st T20I: Faf du Plessis (Captain), Quinton de Kock, JP Duminy, Reeza Hendricks, Imran Tahir, Aiden Markram, David Miller, Lungi Ngidi, Anrich Nortje, Andile Phehlukway, Dwaine Pretorius, Kagiso Rabada, Tabraiz Shamsi, Dale Steyn, Rassie van der Dussen.

2nd and 3rd T20Is: JP Duminy (Captain), Reeza Hendricks, Aiden Markram, David Miller, Chris Morris, Anrich Nortje, Andile Phehlukwayo, Dwaine Pretorius, Sinethemba Qeshile, Tabraiz Shamsi, Lutho Sipamla, Dale Steyn, Rassie van der Dussen.

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