Vidarbha's left handed opening batsman Atharva Taide and pacer Aditya Thakare have been selected in Duleep Trophy squad but surprisingly skipper Akshay Wadkar who led the team to the Ranji Trophy final this year has been ignored,
Both Taide and Thakare will represent the Team 'D' that will be led by Shreyas Iyer.
Stumper Wadkar had played an important role for Vidarbha by scoring 637 runs in ten matches with an avarage of 39.81.It also include seven half centuries and one century and that too in the final against Mumbai in Ranji Trophy final. Despite losing the title clash his knock earned the praise from none other than legendary cricketer Sunil Gavaskar and Mumbai skipper Ajinkya Rahane.
Former VCA senior selector Suhas Phadkar has expressed surprise as Wadkar has been ignored for Duleep Trophy. Talking to Lokmat Times he said, " It is very surprising that player like Wadkar has been ignored. I think he should have been the captain of any Duleep Trophy team."
LEft-handed opening batter Atharva Taide scored 584 runs in eight matches with an average of 41/71 wheeasThakare took 35 wickets in ten matches.
The Duleep Trophy was earlier scheduled to kick-off with two sets of first round matches at Anantapur in Andhra Pradesh from September 5, but now one of those games has been shifted to the M Chinnaswamy Stadium to reduce the logistical inconveniences.
Team D: Shreyas lyer (C), Atharva Taide, Yash Dubey, Devdutt Padikkal, Ishan Kishan (WK), Ricky Bhui, Saransh Jain, Axar Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Aditya Thakare, Harshit Rana, Tushar Deshpande, Akash Sengupta, KS Bharat (WK), Saurabh Kumar. P