“Rehan Ahmed will return home for personal reasons with immediate effect from England Men’s Test tour of India. He will not be returning to India,” ECB said.
England leg-spinner Rehan Ahmed withdrew from the ongoing Test series against India. Ahmed flew back home due to personal reasons and will not return, said the England and Wales Cricket Board just after the toss of the fourth Test in Ranchi.
England’s Rehan Ahmed(REUTERS)
“Rehan Ahmed will return home for personal reasons with immediate effect from England Men’s Test tour of India. He will not be returning to India,” ECB said in a release.
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England will not be replacing Ahmed for the rest of the tour.
Ahmed, who featured in all three Tests of the series, was not included for the fourth Test in Ranchi as England decided to bring back off-spinner Shoaib Bashir into the XI. Bashir made his debut in the second Test in Vizag but was dropped for the third Test in Rajkot for an extra seamer in Mark Wood.
India vs England Live Score 4th Test
Ahmed picked up 11 wickets in the three Tests that he played and was particularly impressive in the second Test in Vizag with three wickets apiece in both the innings.
Notably, Ahmed is the fourth cricketer to withdraw particularly or entire from the India vs England Test series. England batter Harry Brook was the first to pull out of the tour even before England arrived in India. Then it was Virat Kohli who decided to skip the entire series due to the birth of his second child. Last week, India off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin had to fly back home after the end of the second day’s play in Rajkot due to his mother’s illness. He, however, returned to action on Day 4 and is in India’s XI for this Test match.
Ahmed also had his visa issues when the England team arrived in Rajkot after a break in Abu Dhabi. The leg-spinner was stopped at the immigration office at the Rajkot airport for carrying the wrong visa. He was allowed entry after a temporary visa was issued. A couple of days later, BCCI and ECB got together to get the correct visa on time.
Apart from Ahmed, England made another change to their XI for the Ranchi Test. They brought in Ollie Robinson for Mark Wood.
England captain Ben Stokes, who is likely to bowl for the first time in this series, won the toss and opted to bat.
India, on the other hand, handed debut to young pacer Akash Deep in place of Jasprit Bumrah, who was rested from this match due to workload management.
India lead the five-match series 2-1.
India XI: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rohit Sharma(c), Shubman Gill, Rajat Patidar, Sarfaraz Khan, Ravindra Jadeja, Dhruv Jurel(wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Akash Deep, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Siraj.
England XI: Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, Ben Stokes(c), Ben Foakes(wk), Tom Hartley, Ollie Robinson, Shoaib Bashir, James Anderson.
