The Jharkhand team has named Ishan Kishan as their captain for the upcoming season of the Ranji Trophy 2024–25. In their first game, the team will be competing against Assam in Guhawati. This year, Kishan made his return to domestic cricket, representing Jharkhand in the Buchi Babu Trophy, India C in the Duleep Trophy, and the rest of India in the Irani Cup.
Ishan Kishan eyes return to the Indian team
The star wicket-keeper batter was not given the BCCI central contracts in February 2024 after he skipped domestic red-ball matches. Top cricketers were told at the time by BCCI secretary Jay Shah that playing domestic cricket is still a critical benchmark for selection to the national squad and that skipping it may have serious ramifications.
Ishan Kishan is eagerly waiting to make his return to the Indian team and would be hoping he makes it through the Indian squad for the upcoming Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2024.
Those close to the star player believe the secretary's warning does not pertain to Ishan, though. "Ishan has always given priority to the Ranji Trophy. In the 2022-23 season, he was constantly travelling with the Indian cricket team but despite the hectic schedule he played a couple of Ranji Trophy games, and scored a century against Kerala, which helped him earn a place in India’s Test team. All these accusations are just rubbish"
However, Kishan lost his spot on the Indian team across all three formats. Although opener Ruturaj Gaikwad was not available for selection, Kishan had declared himself available for the T20Is against Afghanistan. Nevertheless, Kishan was benched. Kishan has not been able to secure a berth on the national team in any format, despite performing admirably in the few opportunities he has had.
"I was scoring runs and then I found myself on the bench. These things do happen in a team sport. But I experienced travel fatigue. It meant there was something wrong, I was not feeling well or right and so I decided to take a break. However, sadly, barring my family and few close people no one understood that," Kishan told The Indian Express.
Jharkhand Ranji Trophy squad
Ishan Kishan (c), Virat Singh (vc), Kumar Kushagra (wk), Nazim Siddique, Aryaman Sen, Sharandeep Singh, Kumar Suraj, Anukul Roy, Utkarsh Singh, Supriyo Chakraborty, Saurabh Shekhar, Vikas Kumar, Vivekanand Tiwary, Manishi, Ravi Kumar Yadav, Raunak Kumar
