India will open its CT 2025 against Bangladesh on Feb 20 in Dubai.
Former India superstar Suresh Raina has chosen his India playing Xi for the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy 2025 tournament. The ICC event begins on February 19 in Pakistan, while India plays its games in Dubai. India will open the tournament on February 20 against Bangladesh.
Suresh Raina has chosen Kuldeep Yadav to be India’s trump card in the tournament as India pushes for yet another ICC title. Raina, who has chosen his eleven to play consistently throughout the tournament, believes that the presence of three spinners -- allrounders Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel, as well as Kuldeep Yadav -- could be India's best bet for putting pressure on opposing batters at the Dubai International Stadium.
"Kuldeep Yadav is going to be very important because Axar Patel and Ravindra Jadeja contain well in the middle overs, bowling stump to stump; and then Kuldeep can bring in his mystery spin, particularly against Pakistan who play the sweep shot well...New Zealand have a lot of left-handers. The kind of pressure Kuldeep can create and force the batters to go for the big shot, it can lead to wickets,” Raina said on Star Sports.
In the recently finished three-match ODI series against England, skipper Rohit Sharma and head coach Gautam Gambhir chose KL Rahul to Rishabh Pant as wicketkeeper.
While Raina included Pant to his playing XI, he also stated that Rahul may continue to do the job behind the stumps "because he looks in good form".
India will be without their best pacer Jasprit Bumrah for the event after he sustained a back injury during the Sydney Test on the Australian tour in January. He has been succeeded by Harshit Rana.
"Rana provides variation, has a slow bouncer, can swing it. Hardik Pandya will play an important role; we haven't used him much so far," he added.
Raina's selection of the batting line-up was unsurprising, but he chose Rana and Arshdeep Singh as the two specialist pacers, leaving veteran Mohammed Shami out.
Suresh Raina's India playing XI for Champions Trophy:
Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant (wk), Axar Patel, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Arshdeep Singh, Harshit Rana, Kuldeep Yadav