Star batter Rinku Singh who will likely to lead the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 has been appointed as captain for the Uttar Pradesh (UP) team in the upcoming Vijay Hazare Trophy 2024-25 scheduled from December 21. UP team will be high on confidence considering their performance in Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT) 2024. The Bhuvneshwar Kumar-led UP reached the quarter-finals after finishing second in the group stage with five wins and two losses.
Rinku Singh was one of the main reasons behind UP's performance in SMAT. The swashbuckling left-hander was the highest run-scorer for the team as he finished with 277 runs at a strike rate of 152.19 and an average of 69.25 in nine matches.
Rinku who made his India debut in 2023 has played three ODIs and 30 T20Is so far and the upcoming opportunity to lead UP will be a great chance for young batter to establish his leadership skills.
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Rinku has played 57 T20 matches and has 1899 runs at an average of 48.69 and an impressive strike rate of 94.80, including 17 half-centuries and a century.
Uttar Pradesh will start their campaign against Jammu and Kashmir on December 21 in Vizag. They will be up against Mizoram on December 23, followed by games against Tamil Nadu (December 26), Chhattisgarh (December 28), Chandigarh (December 31) and Vidarbha (January 3) in their next league stage matches, respectively.
Uttar Pradesh squad for Vijay Hazare Trophy
Rinku Singh (C), Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Madhav Kaushik, Karan Sharma, Priyam Garg, Nitish Rana, Abhishek Goswami, Akshadeep Nath, Aryan Juyal, Aradhya Yadav, Saurabh Kumar, Kritagya Kumar Singh, Vipraj Nigam, Mohsin Khan, Shivam Mavi, Aquib Khan, Atal Behari Rai, Kartikya Jaiswal, Vineet Panwar.
