New Delhi,
The BCCI senior selection committee will be taking a call on whether to summon Ravichandran Ashwin midway through his county stint as they pick the squad for the first three ODIs against Australia tomorrow.

Ashwin is currently playing for Worcestershire in Division-II of the English County and has a four-match contract, of which only two matches have been played so far. Ashwin’s next assignment is a home game against Leicestershire on September 12-15 followed by his last game against Durham on September 25-28.

If Ashwin is allowed to play these two games, he won’t be available for the ODI series against Australia.

With both Axar Patel and Yuzvendra Chahal performing admirably, the selectors may just allow Ashwin to complete his county engagement. “Ashwin has a contract of four games for Worcestershire. If he is called back after two games only, then the purpose of sending him to get a proper county exposure is lost. It’s the team management and the selectors who decided that he should be playing county cricket,” a BCCI official said. Keeping in mind 23 international matches (11 ODIs, nine T20Is and three Tests) over the next three months, the selectors along with the team management would like to check the workload of the bowling unit — pacers as well as the spinners. The selection meeting is expected to be held through conference call as chairman MSK Prasad and Devang Gandhi are watching the Duleep Trophy match in Lucknow while Sarandeep Singh is in Delhi.

Smith and Co. arrive
Chennai: The second batch of Australian players, including captain Steve Smith, arrived here tonight for the five-match ODI series against India beginning on September 17.

Smith, vice-captain David Warner and five other players of the squad reached here from Dhaka via Mumbai at around 8pm. They straightaway headed to the team hotel after their arrival.

Head coach Darren Lehmann has flown back to Australia after the Bangladesh series and his assistant David Saker would take charge of the team for the ODIs and T20Is.