India aim early momentum as focus shifts to 50-over format

After a hard-fought Test series between South Africa and India, the focus now shifts to the six-match ODI-rubber, the first of which will be staged at the Kingsmead ground in Durban on Thursday.

New Delhi: After a hard-fought Test series between South Africa and India, the focus now shifts to the six-match ODI-rubber, the first of which will be staged at the Kingsmead ground in Durban on Thursday.

The visitors have included eight new players to their ODI squad as former skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Manish Pandey, Shreyas Iyer, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Axar patel, Shardul Thakur and Kedar Jadhav ar the new addition for the high-volatge SA tour.

With only 14 months to go for the 2019 ODI World Cup, India will also look to kick off their preparations in earnest during the series.

India have a long limited-overs' schedule until their next big Test assignment -- the five-Test rubber against England in August.

After the conclusion of South Africa, India will travel to Sri Lanka for a Tri-nation T20 series which also includes Bangladesh. The series is organized to mark 70^th year of Sri Lankan independence.

With so much of limited-overs' cricket to be played in overseas conditions, especially South Africa and England, this will allow the Indian team management to try out the various combinations and fix up certain spots before the quadrennial tournament in England next year.

Speaking of this series, the Men in Blue to try to better their limited-over record against Proteas and win their first ever bilateral series on South Africa soil.

Going into Thursday's tie, India is not expected to make any drastic changes with Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan opening the batting and followed by the likes of Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, Shreyas Iyer and Dhoni.

It will be interesting to see who among the likes of Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav and Dinesh Karthik gets a look-in lower down the order even as the bowling department looks set to be led by Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Jasprit Bumrah.

The hosts, on the other hand, will miss services of veteran batsman AB de Villiers, who is set to miss first three encounters due to a finger injury.

Squads:

India: Virat Kohli (Captain), Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma, Ajinkya Rahane, Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Dinesh Karthik, Kedar Jadhav, Mahendra Singh Dhoni (wk), Hardik Pandya, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Shardul Thakur.