Asia Cup 2025: Ajinkya Rahane Picks His Best XI, Leaves Out Samson, Rinku and Dube

The Indian team has been picked for Asia Cup 2025. The squad doesn't feature many names that were anticipated to be picked, including Shreyas Iyer, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Prasidh Krishna and Ravi Bishnoi. These players were thought to be future T20 stars and have contributed a great deal to this format. But the selection committee, headed by Ajit Agarkar, has signaled these players to wait in addition.

Indian team begins its campaign on 10 September, where they will play UAE. Then Indian team will play Pakistan (IND vs PAK in Asia Cup 2025) on 14 September and Oman (IND vs OMA) on 19 September. For these matches, Team India's veteran batsman Ajinkya Rahane has selected the best 11. Many names among these 11 players are surprising. Rahane has kept stalwarts like Sanju Samson, Rinku Singh and Shivam Dube out of his playing XI.

Rahane has kept Shubman Gill and Abhishek Sharma as openers. After this, Tilak Verma has been kept at one down and Suryakumar Yadav at second down. He has kept Hardik Pandya, Jitesh Sharma and Axar Patel in the middle order. He has included Jasprit Bumrah and Arshdeep Singh as fast bowlers, while Kuldeep Yadav and Varun Chakraborty have been kept as spinners. However, he has advised to keep one of Varun Chakraborty and Harshit Rana in the playing 11.