England Test 5: Bumrah to lead India; Pant vice-captain

Mumbai: The Board of Control of Cricket in India (BCCI) informed on Thursday that star bowler Jasprit Bumrah would lead India in the fifth Test against England, which was rescheduled and to be held in Edgbaston, NDTV reported.

Thus Bumrah became the first bowler to be the captain of the Indian team after Kapil Dev. He also became India's 36th skipper.

The decision comes moments ahead of the captain's press conference on the eve of the match. Young wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant has been named as vice-captain for the match.

The test, the series decider, will start in Birmingham on Friday.

On Wednesday, head coach Rahul Dravid informed that Rohit Sharma was not entirely ruled out as captain. Sharma had tested positive for Covid-19 during India's tour game against Leicestershire.

The BCCI official release read, "Mr Rohit Sharma, Captain, Indian Cricket Team is ruled out of the rescheduled fifth Test against England to be played from Friday. Rohit underwent a RAT Test on Thursday morning and returned a positive result for COVID-19."

"The All-India Senior Selection Committee has named Mr Jasprit Bumrah as captain for the upcoming Test and Mr Rishabh Pant as his deputy," it stated.

Bumrah has taken 123 wickets from 29 Tests and has eight five-wicket hauls too.

Under Virat Kohli, India reached a 2-1 lead against England in 2021. But the final test was cancelled after the Covid-19 outbreak over the Indian team.

India's test team: Jasprit Bumrah (Captain), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Hanuma Vihari, Cheteshwar Pujara, Rishabh Pant (vice-captain) (wk), KS Bharat (wk), Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin, Shardul Thakur, Mohd Shami, Mohd Siraj, Umesh Yadav, Prasidh Krishna, Mayank Agarwal