The Indian team for the ICC Champions Trophy 2025 was almost finalized, and the BCCI had already announced that the press conference for the team selection would be held at 12:30 pm. However, the start of the press conference was delayed by two and a half hours. At around 3 o’clock, captain Rohit Sharma and chief selector Ajit Agarkar came to the press conference and announced the team. During this time, information was also received that Shubhman Gill has been chosen as the vice-captain. The BCCI meeting to appoint Gill as vice-captain and include Rishabh Pant as wicketkeeper lasted for two and a half hours. Due to long discussion on these two decisions, the team was announced late.
According to Dainik Jagran’s report, the press conference was delayed because there was a lot of discussion regarding the vice-captain and Pant. The report said that Team India head coach Gautam Gambhir wanted Hardik Pandya to be made the vice-captain, like he was in the World Cup 2023. Apart from this, the post of vice-captain was also not given to KL Rahul, who had been in this role for some time. At the same time, there was also discussion about the role of the wicketkeeper in the team.
According to reports, Gautam Gambhir wanted Sanju Samson to be included in the team as he had scored three centuries in T20 cricket last year and also had a good average in ODIs. But captain Rohit Sharma and the selection committee considered Rishabh Pant more useful as a wicketkeeper batsman, hence Samson was dropped. At the same time, the situation of Hardik Pandya has also changed, who was the vice-captain of the team till the World Cup 2023. He was also the vice-captain in the T20 World Cup 2024, but after retirement, Rohit Sharma gave the captaincy to Suryakumar Yadav and the vice-captaincy of the ODI team was also snatched away from Hardik.
