Senior cricketers Yuvraj Singh, Gautam Gambhir and Suresh Raina will lead India Red, India Blue and India Green teams respectively in the Duleep Trophy to be played at Greater Noida International Cricket Stadium from August 23 to September 14.
The four-day tournament will be played for the first time with pink ball and under lights.
The selection of Yuvraj, Raina and pacer Jasprit Bumrah, who will play for India Green, raises serious questions over their participation in the two Twenty20 matches against West Indies in Florida, USA on August 27 and 28 as the games clashes with the dates of Duleep Trophy.
All three players Yuvraj, Raina and Bumrah were part of India's ICC Twenty20 World Cup earlier this year.
Wicketkeeper Dinesh Karthik and Test specialist Cheteshwar Pujara, who is witnessing a poor run of form in the ongoing West Indies tour, will play under Gambhir in the India Blue team while veteran off-spinner Harbhajan Singh and Murali Vijay will play for India Green side.
India Red will face India Green in the tournament opener from August 23-26, followed by matches between India Red and India Blue from August 29-September 1, India Blue vs India Green is slated from September 4-7.
The final will be played from September 10-14.
Teams:
India Red: Yuvraj Singh (Capt), Abhinav Mukund, KS Bharat, Sudip Chatterjee Gurkeerat Singh, Ankush Bains (WK), Arun Karthik, Akshay Wakhare, Kuldeep Yadav, Nathu Singh, Anureet Singh, Ishwar Pandey, Nitish Rana, M Ashwin, Abhimanyu Mithun.
India Blue: Gautam Gambhir (Capt), Mayank Agarwal, Sheldon Jackson, Baba Aparajith, Siddhesh Lad, Dinesh Karthik (WK), Parvez Rasool, K Monish, Krishna Das, Suryakumar Yadav, Mohit Sharma, Pankaj Singh, Shardul Thakur, Cheteshwar Pujara, Hanuma Vihari.
India Green: Suresh Raina (Capt), Robin Uthappa, Jalaj Saxena, Ambati Rayudu, Ian Dev Singh, Rohan Prem, Parthiv Patel (WK), Harbhajan Singh, Shreyas Gopal, Ashoke Dinda, Sandeep Sharma, Ankit Rajpoot, Rajat Paliwal, Jasprit Bumrah, Murali Vijay.
