Wade will instead head to New Zealand with Australia's Twenty20 squad for a five-match series starting on Feb. 22 in Christchurch.
High on confidence after decimating a high-profile Royal Challengers Bangalore, an upbeat Gujarat Lions will be aiming to lift their game a notch higher when they face title contenders Mumbai Indians in an Indian Premier League encounter, in Rajkot on Saturday.
A stunning hat-trick from Josh Hazlewood was not enough for Australia, as Darren Sammy led from the front with an unbeaten half-century to fashion a morale-boosting three-wicket win in a World Twenty20 warm-up match at Eden Gardens.
Australia remain optimistic about their Twenty20 World Cup campaign despite being shown up in all facets by India in the opening two matches of their current series. With Steve Smith leading an advanced party to New Zealand for the forthcoming ODI series, the Australians have made more changes to their XI, with Shane Watson to lead the side after skipper Aaron Finch suffered a hamstring injury in Friday night's second T20 defeat. In-form top-order batsman Usman Khawaja comes into the squad as Finch's replacement, and will likely open the batting alongside Shaun Marsh. Finch is awaiting scan results and the Australia camp is bullish he will be able to return before the start of the World Cup in India on March 8.
India showed commendable character in Rajkot to level the series, proving that the panic buttons were pressed prematurely following the 10-wicket loss in Mumbai.
Australia limited-overs skipper Aaron Finch on Friday said several short-format players have a 'very realistic' chance of being overlooked for T20 World Cup selection after opting out of the upcoming tours of West Indies and Bangladesh.
Factbox World Cup match between Australia and England at the MCG.
Australia's top cricketers are effectively unemployed.
Images from the 4th ODI played between India and Australia in Bengaluru on Thursday
Glenn Maxwell, Dale Steyn, Pat Cummins, Josh Hazlewood, Chris Lynn, Mitchell Marsh and Angelo Mathews have been shortlisted at the highest base price of Rs. 2 crore for the upcoming IPL auction, in Kolkata on December 19. Robin Uthappa, who was released by Kolkata Knight Riders last month, is the sole Indian player in the auction list with a base price of Rs 1.5 crore. As many as 332 cricketers will go under the hammer at the auction.
After losing to New Zealand and taking just a point from their washed out match against Bangladesh, Australia probably need to beat Sri Lanka to ensure they finish in the top two in the pool and avoid India or South Africa in the last eight.
The World Cup is just a couple of months away, and even after even a 0-2 loss in the just-concluded T20 series there won't be any shift in plans as far as skipper Virat Kohli and coach Ravi Shastri are concerned.
As Kohli continues to score loads of runs, Gujarat Lion's Aaron Finch took to Twitter and requested, "Dear Virat Kohli, can you please stop making batting look so easy, it's embarrassing for most other batters in the world."
Australia's limited-overs captain Aaron Finch wants the home team players to strike a fine balance when they confront Virat Kohli in the opening Test as he believes, if provoked too much, the India skipper can be ruthless against his opponents.
India are 0-1 down after an inexplicably poor batting performance led to a three-wicket loss in the lung-opener in Visakhapatnam
Australia Test skipper Michael Clarke, opener Aaron Finch and South Australia's Tom Cooper are among eight pall-bearers, which includes Phil Hughes's dad Greg, brother Jason and locals Corey Ireland, Mitchell Lonergan and Matthew Day, for the late cricketer's funeral in Macksville on Wednesday afternoon.
'With the two T20 matches (against India), it's a chance for the guys to continue on their Big Bash form and test themselves against the best in the world in their own conditions'
We spotted some celebs from the world of Hollywood, cricket and comedy enjoying some tennis action and here we give a glimpse of them...
Kings XI Punjab skipper K L Rahul, who scored a hundred against Royal Challengers Bangalore in the IPL match in Dubai on Thursday, said he was lacking confidence in his skills as a batsman heading into the team's second fixture in the tournament.
India needed 14 runs from the last over and Pandya delivered with sixes off the second and fourth deliveries
Australia will need their top order to fire against New Zealand's disciplined attack and persist with four specialist bowlers.
Gujarat Lions defeated Rising Pune Supergiants by seven wickets to register their second win in the Indian Premier League.
The 13-run win saw India grab their first points in the ICC Men's World Cup Super League table.
A win over Australia would see the Black Caps through and represent a strong recovery from their six wicket loss to Pakistan at Edgbaston on Wednesday.
England captain Eoin Morgan refused to hit the panic button after defeat by Australia on Tuesday left his team's hopes of reaching the Cricket World Cup semi-finals in the balance. The pre-tournament favourites and hosts have now lost three group games and may need to beat India and New Zealand in their next two matches to make the last four.
Virat Kohli's tourists are the second ranked ODI side in the world and will be looking to get into their groove in the three 50-over and three Twenty20 matches that precede the four-match Test series around the new year.
Australia have their own speedsters in Mitchell Starc, who is level with Archer with 15 wickets, and Pat Cummins (11).
While some franchises have said there needs to be a six-day quarantine for them and could see them miss their respective teams' opening games, others have pointed out how they should be excused since it would be simply about moving from one bio-secure bubble (in the UK) to another (in the UAE).
Following is a fact box on the final Test of the four-match series between Australia and India
Steve Smith smashed an unbeaten half-century to power Australia to a seven-wicket victory against Pakistan in the second T20 International in Canberra on Tuesday.
Top India batsman Virat Kohli has maintained his second position in the latest ICC batsmen rankings while medium pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar has moved up a place to be seventh in the bowlers' standings.
Australia pace spearhead Pat Cummins on Friday said he is glad that the effort he put into his T20 bowling in the last four-five months is giving him the desired results in the ongoing World Cup, which has been his "main goal" for a while.
The country's Sports Ministry worked closely with the International Cricket Council's (ICC) ACU during the process of drafting the bill.
After making impressive debuts in their respective openers, Rising Pune Supergiants and GujaratLions will test each others' strengths when the two new entrants clash in the Indian Premier League (IPL), in Rajkot on Thursday. The two teams feature a lot of faces from the suspended Chennai Super Kings and at least six players, who played in the same side till last year, will now be in opposite camps. Close friends and CSK teammates Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Suresh Raina will now be devising strategies as rival captains. Both have admitted that playing in a jersey other than 'yellow' has been very "emotional" but have promised to give their all for their new teams. The Dhoni-led Pune Supergiants were very convincing and dominant when they handed defending champions Mumbai Indians a nine-wicket drubbing. They did not even require their middle order, packed with Dhoni himself and players such as Steven Smith, to come out with the top-order delivering it for them comfortably.
Bangladesh thrashed Australia by 60 runs in Dhaka on Monday to secure a comprehensive 4-1 series win, with the tourists' batsmen managing just 62 in 13.4 overs, their worst ever total in the format.
Once again, it was the teacher's son from Vadodara, that mysterious practitioner of lethal magic at the death who ensured that Rohit Sharma's side ended the night an improbable fourth on the IPL points table.
The West Indies used plenty of short-pitched deliveries to dismantle Pakistan in their Cricket World Cup opener, but the Caribbean batsmen will get a taste of their own medicine when they face champions Australia, fast bowler Nathan Coulter-Nile has said.
West Indies opener Chris Gayle, who is a popular name among T20 leagues around the world, was not picked along Sri Lankan fast bowler Lasith Malinga.
Australian batsmen David Warner and Steve Smith were booed and heckled by the crowd in their warm-up game against England in Southampton on Saturday.
Having struggled in the past one year after suspensions of Steve Smith and David Warner, Australia finally seemed to have picked their pieces and playing exactly like a five-time champions ought to.
