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CALCUTTA, Aug 5 (AFP) : Seamer Ajit Agarkar was Thursday recalled to the Indian team for the Champions Trophy one-day tournament in England after left-armer Zaheer Khan was declared unfit with a leg injury.
Test wicket-keeper Parthiv Patel was axed to make way for uncapped India 'A' gloveman Dinesh Karthik in the 14-man squad for the International Cricket Council's 12-nation tournament to be played from September 10 to 25.
Zaheer and Patel are the only omissions from the Asia Cup squad which lost to hosts Sri Lanka in the final Sunday. It was the 10th defeat in 13 one-day finals for Sourav Ganguly's men in the last four years.
Zaheer, dogged by hamstring injuries over the past year, was laid low again during the Asia Cup and hobbled his way in the last two matches.
"Zaheer needs time to recover and the selectors wanted to rest him ahead of a busy home season that includes Tests against Australia and South Africa," said cricket board secretary Karunakaran Nair.
Agarkar fought his way back with a string of good performances for Middlesex in English county cricket, including a 5-81 against Gloucestershire at Lord's on Wednesday.
Patel, 19, was discarded after managing just 132 runs from 14 one-dayers, but remains the number one choice of the selectors for Test matches.
"Parthiv is a very talented cricketer with a lot of promise and should be an automatic choice for Tests," said chief selector Syed Kirmani, himself a former Test wicket-keeper.
"But he is not suited for one-dayers. We needed someone who will be effective with the bat."
Karthik, a dashing 19-year-old batsman-keeper, is currently touring Zimbabwe with the India 'A' side and scored 96 and 52 in the first two matches there.
Left-handed Rohan Gavaskar, son of legendary Indian opener Sunil Gavaskar, will be added to the squad for two one-day tournaments prior to the Champions Trophy.
India play world champions Australia and Pakistan in a one-off series in the Netherlands from August 21 to 28 and then take on England in three matches between September 1-5.
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