The focus will be on Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli on Wednesday, as they turn out for their respective state teams in the Vijay Hazare Trophy matches.
Rohit and Kohli last featured in the tournament in 2017-18 and 2010-11, respectively. Their participation in the domestic tournament is a clear indication of their intent to keep pushing themselves towards the 2027 World Cup.
Rohit has made it clear that he will play the first two matches of Mumbai against Sikkim (on Wednesday) and Uttarakhand (on December 26) in Jaipur.
Kohli, who had been training with former India batting coach Sanjay Bangar in Mumbai, has not yet decided as to which two or three matches he will play for Delhi.
Rishabh Pant-led Delhi will open their Elite Group D campaign against Andhra in Bengaluru at the BCCI Centre of Excellence (CoE)
on Wednesday.
Besides the Ro-Ko show, there are several other interesting matches to explore as well.
Pant will be eager to bring himself back into contention for selection into the white-ball teams. The wicketkeeper-batter has not represented the country in either ODIs or T20Is since August 2024.
Shubman Gill, on the other hand, will be picking himself up after the selectors’ call to overlook him for the upcoming T20 World Cup. He will be turning out for Punjab against Maharashtra in Jaipur.
For Gill, it will be a good warm-up ahead of next month’s three-match ODI series against New Zealand in which he will lead India.
The tournament will also offer a timely opportunity for T20I captain Suryakumar Yadav, who has struggled with his form, to silence the critics. Over the past year, Surya has averaged a mere 12.84 and struck at only 117.87 in T20Is, with no half-centuries across 22 innings while batting at No. 3 and 4.
The T20I captain has maintained that he has been striking the ball well in the nets, but he needs to prove that he still has it in him to deliver as promised.
The likes of Ishan Kishan, who led Jharkhand to the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy title earlier this month, Arshdeep Singh and Varun Chakravarthy will also get a chance to make their case in the 50-over format.
Karnataka are the defending champions, and have been boosted by Karun Nair’s
return. Nair made 779 runs in eight innings last season, averaging 389.5, including
six centuries.