Shastri to skip Zimbabwe series

India's team director Ravi Shastri is set to skip the tour of Zimbabwe next month owing to professional commitments that he had had agreed upon before the BCCI offered him a two-year contract extension. India will be managed in Zimbabwe by the three assistant coaches B Arun, Sanjay Bangar and R Sridhar, who have been with the team for almost a year now.

Shastri is understood to have agreed for an analyst role during the high-profile Ashes series with Sky, the official broadcaster. According to a BCCI insider, since Shastri had signed the Sky deal before he was offered the role of team director for the tour of Bangladesh, he had made it clear he would not be available for the series in Zimbabwe. The BCCI, though, is confident that Shastri will be available for India's three-Test series in Sri Lanka starting in August.

This would be the second time since taking over as team director during India's tour to England last year that Shastri will not be with the Indian team. He had also skipped the first half of the tri-series in Australia before the World Cup because of personal reasons.