He scalped 15 wickets in 13 matches at an economy of 10.18.
The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has faced a lot of questions since releasing the 20-member squad for the ACC Men’s Asia Cup 2025. Several former players and fans have already protested the omission of star Indian batter Shreyas Iyer and opener Yashasvi Jaiswal from the squad. The former Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) player Aakash Chopra is the latest inclusion in that list.
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The former batter pointed out Harshit’s Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 stats to raise questions over the pacer’s spot in the team for the upcoming multi-national tournament. The seamer was retained by the IPL 2024 champions, KKR, ahead of the following season. However, the 23-year-old scalped 15 wickets in 13 matches at an economy of 10.18.
“The last IPL was extremely ordinary. His performances have not been very good. It doesn’t seem like his numbers are strong enough to deserve a place on the side,” stated Chopra on his YouTube channel.
Instead of Harshit, BCCI could have included any of the star Gujarat Titans (GT) pace duo, Prasidh Krishna or Mohammed Siraj, opined the cricketer-turner-commentator. Before an impressive Test tour of England, Krishna also had a stunning IPL 2025 season with a total of 25 wickets. With this, he also became the highest wicket-taker of this season and won the Purple Cap.
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On the other hand, after his seven-year stint with the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB), Siraj snared 16 wickets in 15 matches at an economy of 9.25 in his debut season for GT. The bowler followed this up with a spectacular performance in the recently concluded red-ball series in England. Besides the last match heroics at The Oval, his magnificent performance also included 185-plus overs and 23 wickets, to become the top-most wicket-taker of the Anderson-Tendulkar series 2025.
“If you see the recent record, you will find that Prasidh Krishna should have got a chance, or you could have thought about rewarding Mohammed Siraj, but the team has once again gone towards Harshit,” added the former Indian batter.
The IPL 2024 winning captain, Shreyas, also had a stellar IPL 2025 with 604 runs in 17 matches at a blistering strike rate of 175.07. He also became only the second skipper in the league’s history to guide the Punjab Kings (PBKS) into the IPL Final. However, all of these stats were unable to earn him a spot in India’s squad for the upcoming 20-over tournament.
But the former KKR batter has opined that if the 30-year-old continues to perform well in the 50-over format, he may hear back from the selectors for the shortest format soon. He is also hopeful for the PBKS skipper to make it to the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026.
“There are 15 T20Is after this. The world changes in 15 T20Is. If he keeps scoring runs in ODIs, sooner or later, Shreyas Iyer will be part of the team. I have a strong feeling that Shreyas Iyer will be a part of India’s T20 World Cup team,” said Chopra.
However, the 17th edition of the Asia Cup 2025 will begin on September 9. Reigning champions India will kick off their campaign against the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on September 10.
Surya Kumar Yadav (C), Shubman Gill (VC), Abhishek Sharma, Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Jitesh Sharma (WK), Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh, Varun Chakaravarthy, Kuldeep Yadav, Sanju Samson (WK), Harshit Rana, Rinku Singh.
