Harbhajan Singh unlikely to feature in Duleep Trophy

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) declared the Duleep Trophy 2016 teams and experienced campaigners in the likes of Yuvraj Singh, Gautam Gambhir, and Suresh Raina have been appointed to lead the India Red, Blue, and Green teams.

Indian off-spinner Harbhajan Singh was a part of the India Green team and was expected to lead the bowling attack of the team led by Raina. But it is now speculated that Harbhajan might miss at least the initial games of the tournament due to family commitments.

He and wife Geeta Basra were recently blessed with a daughter and he is in London on paternal duty. “Harbhajan’s daughter is not even a month old. It is quite natural that he needs to be with his wife and daughter at this point of time. Family is always the top most priority. He is currently in the United Kingdom with his family,” a BCCI source was quoted by PTI.

The Indian team led by Virat Kohli is currently touring West Indies and a majority of men from the same squad will later fly to Florida for a 2-T20I series against West Indies. A few players from the team have been picked for the Duleep Trophy while others are expected to join in later.

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At around the same time, the India A team will also be in mid of the quadrangular series in Australia. Manish Pandey is the skipper of the India A side and will miss the first Indian tournament to be played with the pink ball.

India Red: Abhinav Mukund, KS Bharat, Sudip Chatterjee, Gurkeerat Singh, Yuvraj Singh (c), Ankush Bains, Arun Karthik, Akshay Wakhare, Kuldeep Yadav, Nathu Singh, Anureet Singh, Ishwar Pandey, Nitish Rana, M Ashwin, Abhimanyu Mithun

India Blue: Gautam Gambhir (c), Mayank Agarwal, Sheldon Jackson, Baba Aprajith, 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: Robin Uthappa, Jalaj Saxena, Ambati Rayudu, Ian Dev Singh, Rohan Prem, Suresh Raina (c), Parthiv Patel (wk), Harbhajan Singh, Shreyas Gopal, Ashoke Dinda, Sandeep Sharma, Ankit Rajpoot, Rajat Paliwal, Jasprit Bumrah, Murali Vijay

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