India name Kohli as U-19 captain

Virat Kohli, the Delhi middle-order batsman, has been named captain of the India Under-19 squad for the World Cup in Malaysia next month with the former captain Tanmay Srivistava overlooked. Dav Whatmore, the former Sri Lanka coach and current director of operations at the National Cricket Academy, will coach the party.

Kohli, who has been a regular in the U-19 side since 2006, comes off the back of a strong domestic season where he made 373 runs at 53 in five first-class matches including a top score of 159.

Ravindra Jadeja, the allrounder from Saurashtra, will act as vice-captain for the tournament which runs from February 17 to March 2. The squad will undergo a training camp in Bangalore from February 1-8 before leaving for Malaysia on February 9.

India are pooled with West Indies, South Africa and Papua New Guinea in Group B and will play their preliminary league matches in Kuala Lumpur on February 17 ([Papua New Guinea], 19 [South Africa] and 22 [West Indies].

The top two teams in each of the four groups will qualify for the Super League quarter-finals, to be played in Kuala Lumpur on February 24 and 25. The semi-finals are scheduled for February 27 and 29 and the final is on March 3, all in Kuala Lumpur.

India reached the final in the 2006 tournament, staged in Sri Lanka, before collapsing in dramatic style to 9 for 6 against Pakistan in Colombo.

India squad Virat Kohli (capt), Abhinav Mukund, Shreevats Goswami, Tanmay Srivastava, Manish Pandey, Taruvar Kohli, Ravindra Jadeja, Saurav Tiwary, D Shivkumar, Pradeep Sangwan, Siddarth Kaul, Ajitesh Argal, Napoleon Einstein, Perry Goyal, Iqbal Abdulla.