Youngster Sai Sudharsan of India was named the vice-captain of the Tamil Nadu side, his domestic team, for the next season of the Vijay Hazare Trophy. The Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA) revealed the tournament squad and gave Sudharsan the vice-captaincy role. The veteran player Narayan Jagadeesan will captain the team.
The Vijay Hazare Trophy’s first match will be between the teams till January 18 next year. The five-time winners Tamil Nadu are in the Elite Group A, with Karnataka, Pondicherry, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala, and Tripura. The team is surely keen to kick off their campaign on a positive note, in contrast to their domestic season so far.
Sai Sudharsan will have a vital role in turning the tide for his domestic team – who are not having a great season so far in other formats. The Ranji Trophy is over for Tamil Nadu in terms of the qualification race. They have dropped a lead in two of their games and have also lost two games outright. The team is in seventh place with just five points.
The Tamil Nadu team in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT) finished at the bottom of the league stage for four consecutive years and this time they could win only three out of seven matches. To make things worse, they lost to Rajasthan in the pre-quarterfinals of the Vijay Hazare Trophy last year, and they will be eager to restore their pride.
An Important Campaign For Sai Sudharsan
The 24-year-old Tamil Nadu player is one of the best in the domestic scene. He was given the 3rd bat position in the longest format of the game for India, which indicates how much he is trusted and how much he can control the situation with the bat. However, he has to take full advantage of his past experience and lead his team through the tournament.
So far, Sai Sudharsan has played 28 List A games in which he has scored 1,396 runs with a whopping average of 60.69 which is really good. He has made a maximum score of 154 and also has a strike-rate close to 100 which means he can keep the scoreboard moving. What’s more, the vice-captain of Tamil Nadu cricket holds the record of six centuries and six fifties in List A cricket, which is quite impressive.
One of the points that have been the spotlight in the squad announcement is the case of players Sandeep Warrier and T. Natarajan who have been left out of the 16-member squad. On the other hand, Shahrukh Khan who was dropped during the SMAT has also not been included in the team. The association has rewarded seven players from the Under-23 squad that won the BCCI one-day competition who were part of the Under-23 squad that won the BCCI one-day competition.
Tamil Nadu Squad For Vijay Hazare Trophy 2025-26
N. Jagadeesan (Capt.), B. Sai Sudharsan (Vice-capt), B. Indrajith, Pradosh Ranjan Paul, C. Andre Siddarth, M. Boopathi Vaishna Kumar, S. Mohamed Ali, S.R. Athish, R. Sai Kishore, Sachin Rathi, Gurjapneet Singh, C.V. Achyuth, G. Govinth, R. Sonu Yadav, Sunny Sandhu, V.S. Karthick Manikandan.
