World Cup organisers on Sunday accepted India's request to include seamer Mohit Sharma in place of pace spearhead Ishant Sharma, who was ruled out of the tournament due to a knee injury. The World Cup's technical committee had agreed to make the change in the defending champions' 15-man squad led by Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the International Cricket Council said in a statement.
The lanky Ishant, the most experienced seamer in India's current squad with 106 wickets from 76 one-day internationals, has not played since being injured during the Boxing Day Test against Australia in Melbourne in December.
Mohit, 26, who has played 12 one-dayers and taken 10 wickets, is already in Australia as an additional member of the team that played in the recent tri-series that also featured England.
India, who lost the preceding Test series against Australia 2-0 and failed to make the tri-series final, open their World Cup campaign against arch-rivals Pakistan in Adelaide on February 15.