Mumbai: India, on Tuesday, announced its 15-member T20 squad for the Asia Cup, starting September 9 in the UAE. Suryakumar Yadav will lead the team on anticipated lines while Shubman Gill was appointed vice-captain. Ace pacer Jasprit Bumrah was also included in the squad.
India is placed in Group A of the Asia Cup alongside Pakistan, Oman, and UAE.
Gill has established himself as a successful Test captain in the recently concluded series against England. His last T20 match was against Sri Lanka at Pallekele in 2024. Maybe, this helped in his replacing Axar Patel as the deputy skipper.
“Gill’s form in England was something we expected but he exceeded it all,” chief selector Ajit Agarkar said during the squad announcement press conference.
There were some doubts about Bumrah’s availability, with the home Test series against the West Indies coming up in October, but the selectors decided to pick him after all. This will be his first T20 tournament since last year’s World Cup.
Left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav too has been drafted in, while Jitesh Sharma will be the back-up wicketkeeper batter.
Yashasvi Jaiswal was among the five standby players chosen by the selectors. The other players in the standby are Washington Sundar, Prasidh Krishna, Dhruv Jurel, and Riyan Parag.
“It’s very unfortunate for Yashasvi Jaiswal. With Abhishek doing well and also giving us a bowling option, one of the two had to miss out. Again, Shreyas Iyer has missed out for no fault of his. He has to wait for his chances,” Agarkar said.
Both Iyer and Jaiswal performed well in IPL 2025. Iyer led Punjab Kings to the final, scoring 604 runs in 17 innings at an average of 50.33 and a strike rate of 175.07 with six fifties to his credit, and the best score of 97*.
Jaiswal was also the leading run-scorer for Rajasthan Royals by a long way in IPL 2025. He scored 559 in 14 matches at a strike rate of 159.71 and an average of 43, with six fifties to his name.
India squad for Asia Cup:
Suryakumar Yadav (captain), Shubman Gill (vice-captain), Abhishek Sharma, Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Jasprit Bumrah, Jitesh Sharma, Shivam Dube, Arshdeep Singh, Sanju Samson, Harshit Rana, Tilak Varma, Rinku Singh, Varun Chakravarthy.
