Shashi Tharoor, the Congress Member of Parliament for Thiruvananthapuram, has blamed the Kerala Cricket Association (KCA) for Sanju Samson’s omission from India’s 2025 Champions Trophy squad, which was announced on Saturday (January 18).
According to Tharoor, KCA’s decision to drop Samson for the Vijay Hazare Trophy was the reason behind the 30-year-old failing to find a spot in the 15-member squad.
Once hailed as a prodigious talent, Samson made his India debut in 2015 at the age of 21. For the next five years, he was overlooked in the national side before he finally earned a call-up in 2020.
As of today, Samson has represented India in 16 ODIs and 37 T20Is so far. While the wicketkeeper-batter is yet to get consistent opportunities in the 50-over format, the rest to Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shubman Gill opened doors for him in the shortest format last year.
Samson made most of the opportunities at the top of the order and slammed three centuries across seven T20Is against Bangladesh and South Africa.
In ODIs, Samson has scored 510 runs at an average of 56.66 and a strike-rate of 99.60 with a hundred and three fifties to show for his efforts. His last ODI appearance for India was in December 2023 when he scored 108 against South Africa in Paarl.
Samson was part of Kerala’s squad in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (domestic 20-over tournament) but opted out of the preparatory camp for the Vijay Hazare Trophy (domestic 50-over tournament). H
While Samson told KCA that he would be available for the tournament, the board decided to overlook him.
Speaking to Onmanorama, KCA secretary Vinod S Kumar said that Samson wrote two emails to the board, stating his availability but he was not picked.
“But by then, the squad was finalised. It would have been unfair to sacrifice a youngster at that point,” Vinod stated.
The turn of events left Shashi Tharoor frustrated. He took to social media platform X (formerly Twitter) and accused KCA of destroying Samson’s career.
“The sorry saga of the Kerala Cricket Association and Sanju Samson – the player wrote to KCA, in advance, regretting his inability to attend a training camp between the SMA and the Vijay Hazare Trophy tournaments, and was promptly dropped from the squad – has now resulted in Sanju’s exclusion from the Indian team,” Tharoor tweeted.
“A batsman who has a highest score of 212* in the Hazare, who averages 56.66 in ODIs for India (including a century in his last outing, against South Africa) is having his career destroyed by the egos of cricket administrators. Doesn’t it bother the KCA bosses that by leaving Sanju out, they ensured Kerala didn’t even reach the quarter-finals of the Hazare? Where does this leave him?”
In the absence of Samson, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant have been named as the wicketkeepers in India’s Champions Trophy squad.
India squad for Champions Trophy 2025: Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill (vc), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul, Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Shami, Arshdeep Singh, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rishabh Pant and Ravindra Jadeja
