Saurabh Tiwary, the India Under-19 batsman, has been appointed captain of Jharkhand. The state selectors have handed him the leadership after he impressed in the role during the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, where Jharkhand won three of four games. He has replaced the medium-pacer Shiv Shankar Rao, who found no place in the 15-man squad named for the Ranji Trophy Plate League match against Tripura starting November 3.
Earlier this year Tiwary committed to his state side, which languishes in the Plate League, rather than move to a stronger team to pursue his dreams of playing for India. He scored 547 runs at 60.77, with a pair of centuries, in last season's Ranji Trophy. He was part of the World Cup-winning India U-19 side and also played three matches for the Mumbai Indians last season in the IPL.
Notable new faces amed in the squad were Tejashwi Yadav, son of politician Laloo Prasad Yadav, Rameez Nemat, Sidhartha Raj Sinha, Rahul Shukla and Kundan Singh. The former captain Rajeev Kumar and medium-pacer Mihir Diwakar also feature.
Team: Saurabh Tiwary (capt), Manish Vardhan, Sujit Roy, Ishank Jaggi, Rameez Nemat, Varun Aaron, Rahul Shukla, Kuldeep Sharma, Siddhartha Raj Sinha, SP Gautam, Mihir Diwakar, Rajeev Kumar, Tejashwi Yadav, Shahbaz Nadeem and Kundan Singh.