India head coach Gautam Gambhir returns home from England for family emergency

London: India coach Gautam Gambhir returned home on Friday because of a family emergency, a week out from the opening cricket test against England.

Gambhir's mother was hospitalised in New Delhi, according to the Press Trust of India.

It was not known how long Gambhir will be away, and there was no certainty he will be on hand when India starts the first test against England at Leeds in a week.

In his absence, assistant coaches Sitanshu Kotak, Ryan ten Doeschate and Morne Morkel were taking charge of India for a four-day intra-squad match against India A that started on Friday in Beckenham.

Gambhir and new captain Shubman Gill were facing a number of selection decisions going into the five-match series with England after the retirements of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma opened spots in the batting order.

A call over the makeup of the bowling attack was also due, with one of Arshdeep Singh, Mohammed Siraj and Prasidh Krishna likely to miss out, alongside one of the two allrounders, Shardul Thakur and Nitish Reddy.

The tourists wore black armbands and observed a minute’s silence on the first morning of their intra-squad match, as a mark of respect for the victims of the Ahmedabad plane crash.

The five-Test tour of England starts June 20 at Leeds and lasts until August 2025. With India lining up without its batting bigwigs Rohit and Virat following their retirement from the game's longest format, the onus lies on the Shubman-led revamped side to prove itself away from home in testing and gruelling English conditions.

The series will be held from June to August, with matches scheduled at Headingley in Leeds, Edgbaston in Birmingham, Lord's and The Oval in London, and Old Trafford in Manchester.

India squad: Shubman Gill (c), Rishabh Pant (vc), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudharsan, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Karun Nair, Nitish Reddy, Ravindra Jadeja, Dhruv Jurel, Washington Sundar, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav.

England squad: Shoaib Bashir, Jacob Bethell, Harry Brook, Brydon Carse, Sam Cook, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Jamie Overton, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Jamie Smith (wk), Ben Stokes (capt), Josh Tongue, Chris Woakes.