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The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Monday announced the list of match officials that will take charge of the World Test Championship (WTC) final between Australia and India at The Oval, starting June 7.
The WTC final between Australia and India is set to take place between June 7 and 11, with June 12 earmarked as the reserve day. New Zealand's Chris Gaffaney and England's Richard Illingworth have been announced as the on-field umpires at The Oval for the marquee clash between Australia and India. Gaffaney and Illingworth will be supported by England's Richard Kettleborough, who has been appointed as the TV umpire, while Kumar Dharmasena of Sri Lanka will act as the fourth umpire. Richie Richardson of the West Indies will be the match referee. "Gaffaney, 48, will be standing in his 49th Test match while it will be the 64th Test for 59-year-old Illingworth, who also stood in the first WTC Final two years ago that New Zealand won with an eight-wicket victory over India in Southampton," ICC said in an official statement. This will be a second successive World Test Championship Final match for Kettleborough, who acted as the TV umpire for the 2021 World Test Championship Final between India and New Zealand at Southampton. Earlier, India and Australia submitted their final squads to the ICC on Sunday, with Australia trimming their original 17-player squad by two to land on the 15 players that will take on India in south London from June 7. Experienced seamer Josh Hazlewood remains in the mix to play against India after he was named in Australia's finalised 15-player group. Meanwhile, India have made no changes to the 15-player squad they named following KL Rahul's withdrawal due to injury, although uncapped youngster Yashasvi Jaiswal earns a late call-up as a standby player on the back of his excellent recent efforts in the IPL. Jaiswal was in fine form for the Rajasthan Royals, accumulating 625 runs from 14 matches at a strike rate of 163.61. He will replace Ruturaj Gaikwad as one of three standby players for India, with the left-hander already holding a visa for England and able to fly to London immediately. He joins fellow white-ball star Suryakumar Yadav and uncapped seamer Mukesh Kumar as the standby options for India, with the trio joining the squad of 15 in London in the coming days as both sides prepare for the eagerly-awaited contest. Australia squad: Pat Cummins (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey (wk), Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Josh Inglis (wk), Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Todd Murphy, Steve Smith (vc), Mitchell Starc and David Warner. Standby players: Mitch Marsh and Matthew Renshaw. India squad: Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, KS Bharat (wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Shardul Thakur, Mohd. Shami, Mohd. Siraj, Umesh Yadav, Jaydev Unadkat and Ishan Kishan (wk). Standby players: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Mukesh Kumar and Suryakumar Yadav. (ANI)
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