Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh) [India], June 8 : Former Indian cricketer Piyush Chawla expressed faith in new-look Indian squad for the five-match England tour, saying that while they are inexperienced at international level, they have still played a lot of cricket and know how to deal with situations that come up in a game.
Piyush was speaking to the media at the engagement ceremony of Indian batter Rinku Singh and Samajwadi Party MP Priya Saroj.
Speaking about the England tour, Piyush told the media, "They are not very experienced at the international level, but they have played a lot of cricket and know how to deal with the situations. Things will be better."
The five-Test England tour starting from June 20 will kickstart not only India's ICC World Test Championship (WTC) 2025-27 cycle, but also a new era under the captaincy of Shubman Gill following the retirements of legends Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.
India's Test squad for England series: Shubman Gill (c), Rishabh Pant (vc), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudharsan, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Karun Nair, Nitish Reddy, Ravindra Jadeja, Dhruv Jurel, Washington Sundar, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav.
On the engagement of Rinku, the 27-year-old who has played 33 T20Is and two ODIs for India, he said, "My best wishes to both of them."
Notably, Chawla announced retirement from all formats of the game on Friday.
Piyush is known for his early impact. As a 15-year-old, he represented India Under-19 and Uttar Pradesh U-22. In his first first-class season, he took 35 wickets and scored 224 runs to help Uttar Pradesh (UP) win their first Ranji Trophy.
Chawla played 35 matches for India across all formats and grabbed 43 wickets at an average of 35.76 and an economy of 4.75. He has had a successful career in the Indian Premier League, where he played for various teams, including the Punjab Kings, Kolkata Knight Riders, Chennai Super Kings, and Mumbai Indians.
He grabbed 192 wickets in 192 fixtures at an average of 26.60 and an economy rate under eight.
Also, another former Indian cricketer Praveen Kumar also said about the engagement to ANI, "The ceremony was good. I wish them all the best for this new inning..."
Since the conclusion of the T20 World Cup, Rinku has become a regular in the format but has yet to earn a spot in the ODI format.
Rinku has featured in two ODIs for India, having made 55 runs. In 33 T20I matches and 24 innings, Rinku has scored 546 runs at an average of 42.00 and a strike rate of 161.06, with three half-centuries. He is yet to smash his maiden T20I century. The 27-year-old made his T20I debut against Ireland in 2023. He was also an Asian Games gold medalist winner at Hangzhou back in 2023 with Indian cricket team.
Rinku has been one of the main players for Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in the Indian Premier League (IPL). He has played 59 matches in the T20 tournament and scored 1099 runs at a strike rate of 145.20. He slammed four half-centuries in the cash-rich tournament.
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