Rising Star McClenaghan Among Five News Faces In New Zealand ODI Squad

Rising Star McClenaghan Among Five News Faces In New Zealand ODI Squad

Mitchell McClenaghan (centre) has been rewarded for an excellent debut T20 series.

©REUTERS/Rogan Ward. Picture Supplied by Action Images

New Zealand have named five uncapped players in their squad for the three-match One-Day International series against South Africa which follows the two-match Test series next month. Colin Munro, Corey Anderson, Mitchell McClenaghan, Ronnie Hira and Jimmy Neesham are all included after performing relatively well in the three-match T20 series, which South Africa won 2-1 earlier this week.

The Black Caps will be strengthened by the returns of regulars Kane Williamson, BJ Watling, Kyle Mills and Adam Milne, who all missed the T20 series for varying reasons. Doug Bracewell has been rested in order to “manage his workload”.

"[It] is in-line with our policy to sensibly manage player workloads," New Zealand coach Mike Hesson said. "He [Bracewell] has a big role to play in the Test series against South Africa and will benefit from the opportunity to freshen up ahead of the home series [in February-March] against England."

McClenaghan’s inclusion among the 15 players is reward for his rapid rise among New Zealand’s pace bowling stocks. He was originally only named in the T20 squad, but was added to the Test squad at a later date as a replacement for the injured Tim Southee and has now been included in the ODI squad.

Of the 15-man squad selected, National Selector Kim Littlejohn said, "We're keen to show consistency in selection for our short-form side and retain the nucleus of the squad who competed in the T20 series, along with four players from the last ODI series against Sri Lanka. There is healthy competition for places in our starting line-up at present and we are working on developing a larger group of players who can compete at international level."

The first of three ODIs is on 19th January in Paarl.

New Zealand ODI squad: Brendon McCullum (captain), Corey Anderson, Trent Boult, James Franklin, Martin Guptill, Ronnie Hira, Mitchell McClenaghan, Nathan McCullum, Kyle Mills, Adam Milne, Colin Munro, Jimmy Neesham, Rob Nicol, BJ Watling, Kane Williamson.

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