Rohit hurt his hamstring during a practice session on Sunday.
Team India suffered a massive blow ahead of their departure for South Africa with Test vice-captain Rohit Sharma hurting his hamstring at practice in Mumbai. As a result, he has been ruled out of the three-match Test series and a call on his fitness for the ODIs to follow will be taken later.
BCCI has confirmed Priyank Panchal as replacement in a media release, which stated, “Team India Test vice-captain Rohit Sharma sustained a left hamstring injury during his training session here in Mumbai yesterday. He has been ruled out of the upcoming 3-match Test series against South Africa. Priyank Panchal will replace Rohit Sharma in the Test squad.”
Panchal recently did well for India A in the four-day matches against South Africa A and has been rewarded for the good showing.
Rohit was recently named the new captain in both white-ball formats after Virat Kohli stepped down as T20I captain and subsequently was removed as ODI captain as the selectors felt it would be better to have just one white-ball captain going forward.
India's updated Test squad: Virat Kohli (Captain), KL Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Priyank Panchal, Shreyas Iyer, Hanuma Vihari, Rishabh Pant (wicket-keeper), Wriddhiman Saha (wicket-keeper), R Ashwin, Jayant Yadav, Ishant Sharma, Mohd. Shami, Umesh Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Shardul Thakur, Md. Siraj.