Fans in India have been bingeing on T20 cricket this year, starting with the Men’s T20 World Cup, followed by a two-month-long IPL. A few days after the T20 league, there was the one-off Test against Afghanistan.
After witnessing cricket at both extremes of the sport’s format spectrum, focus now shifts to the middle ground over the next week when the Men in Blue take on the Afghans in a three-match ODI series starting here at the picturesque HPCA Stadium on Saturday.
Nowadays, there is heightened buzz whenever India plays one-dayers, considering two of the country’s biggest stars, Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, continue to don the national colors only in this format.
Unfortunately, Kohli will miss this assignment due to a hamstring injury he sustained during the IPL final. Fans, though, can still enjoy former skipper Rohit, who has recently cleared his fitness test. And it is an aspect of the opener’s game that the decision-makers will keenly watch as they chart out their preparations for the 2027 World Cup.
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Rohit had a lean IPL in which he missed five games due to injury and needs to make full use of these outings to regain form. The 39-year-old will become the oldest cricketer to play for the country in ODIs and is due for a big knock after a below-par effort against New Zealand earlier in the year.
On the team combination front, though Yashasvi Jaiswal has replaced Kohli, the team has a readymade one-drop batter in Ishan Kishan, who has been recalled to the side after more than two years. The hosts will also want to see what promising pacers Prince Yadav and Gurnoor Brar, along with all-rounder Harsh Dubey, can offer.
While on paper the Shubman Gill-led outfit starts as favourites, the visitors won’t be a pushover. Afghanistan has won its previous five bilateral ODI series, beating teams such as South Africa, Ireland, Zimbabwe, and Bangladesh (twice). Hashmatullah Shahidi’s squad has good depth across departments. Mohammad Nabi and Rashid Khan bring valuable experience to a line-up that also boasts exciting young talents.
Since the first meeting between the two sides in 2010, Afghanistan men have not defeated India in any of the three versions. However, this series offers the upstart — which has beaten every other full-member side in international cricket — a chance to change that. And they only need to look at their own ‘A’ team, which upstaged India-A in Sri Lanka in a one-day game on Thursday, for inspiration. Can the senior team follow suit?
Squads:
India: Shubman Gill (Capt.), Rohit Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shreyas Iyer (vc), KL Rahul (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Nitish Kumar Reddy, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna, Prince Yadav, Gurnoor Brar, Harsh Dubey.
Afghanistan: Hashmatullah Shahidi (Capt.), Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Ibrahim Zadran, Sediqullah Atal, Rahmat Shah, Ikram Alikhil (wk), Mohammad Nabi, Azmatullah Omarzai, Rashid Khan, Nangyal Kharotai, Allah Ghazanfar, Zia Ur Rahman Sharifi, Fareed Malik, Bilal Sami.
Published on Jun 12, 2026
