Ishan Kishan, East Zone’s captain, has been disqualified from the six-team tournament, causing them to suffer yet another blow ahead of the Duleep Trophy. They have lost pacer Akash Deep’s services, so this comes after that. Abhimanyu Easwaran has been appointed captain since Kishan is not available.
It was anticipated that the wicketkeeper-batter would be among the tournament’s top players. However, he has been forced out due to fitness worries, especially with the Asia Cup 2025 approaching. Kishan had only been selected captain two weeks prior. He last played for Nottinghamshire in the County Championship in June.
He even checked in for a fitness evaluation at the BCCI Centre of Excellence (CoE) with the goal of redeeming himself through the Duleep Trophy. Aashirwad Swain, 20, has been draughted into the team to take his position. Swastik Samal has been recruited as a standby, and Swain, who has performed well in age-group cricket, will join fellow Odia hitter Sandeep Pattnaik.
Bengal batsman Easwaran, who was initially an unexpected exclusion from the captaincy despite his experience, is now in charge. Easwaran, the captain of the India A team and a recent member of the Indian Test team against England, has been the mainstay of Bengal’s batting for almost ten years. Over 7800 runs have been scored by him in 103 first-class games.
Easwaran is still waiting for his India debut despite his consistency. Kishan is one of around 15 players who have made their Test debuts for India since his first national call-up. The most recent Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy, which finished in a 2-2 draw, saw Easwaran sit on the bench.
This is just one more unpleasant setback for Ishan Kishan.
He has been in and out of India’s squads over the past year, and the Duleep Trophy is viewed as a crucial chance for him to make a comeback. His comeback aspirations have once again been put on hold after he was sidelined by an unfortunate scooter accident earlier this year that prevented him from playing in the last Test match against England.
Squad East:
Sandeep Patnaik, Virat Singh, Denish Das, Sridam Paul, Sharandeep Singh, Kumar Kushagra, Riyan Parag, Utkarsh Singh, Manishi, Suraj Sindhu Jaiswal, Mukesh Kumar, Mukhtar Hussain, Mohammed Shami, and Abhimanyu Easwaran (C) and Aasirwad Swain (WK)
Standbys: Rahul Singh, Sudip Kumar Gharami, Swastik Samal, and Vaibhav Suryavanshi
India
