India Test squad for England 2025 tour announced; New Captain, Vice-Captain picked

The India Test squad for England tour 2025 has been announced. It is worth noting that Shubman Gill has been announced as the captain of the Test team. Rishabh Pant has been named the vice-captain of the Test side.

Team India will be touring England for a 5-match Test series, which will commence on June 20th, 2025. This will be the first series for the visitors after notable Test retirements of India veterans, Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.

Immense pressure on Gautam Gambhir

It will also be the first Test series for the Gautam Gambhir-coached side in the new WTC Cycle. Until the last World Test Championship Cycle, Rohit Sharma was the captain of the team for the last couple of years.

SHORTS

View More

Your daily dose of cricket!

Loading...

The selection committee had multiple puzzles to solve when they sat to pick the India squad for the England tour. The most important puzzle was solving the Test captaincy race. It is now clear that Shubman Gill is the new captain who will be leading the side.

Multiple puzzles to solve for the India selection committee

Apart from this, the opening pair was also an issue for the selectors to resolve, given Rohit Sharma's departure. Yashasvi Jaiswal's place is rock solid as one opener. However, the other opener's place was up for grabs.

Another puzzle was to solve as to who will replace legend Virat Kohli at his number 4 batting position in Tests. The veteran had played more than 100 Tests for the national side and had scored more than 9000 runs in the format.

Captain Shubman Gill is himself in the reckoning apart from KL Rahul and Karun Nair to take up Kohli's batting spot. It will be a tough challenge for the successor, as Kohli had amazing numbers in England when he traveled during the 2018 season.

It will also be interesting to see how Jasprit Bumrah's workload will be managed across all 5 Tests in England. Notably, Bumrah had a long injury layoff after toiling hard in Australia across all 5 Tests.

His fitness has been one of the major reasons behind his not being appointed as the Test captain. Mohammed Shami is another Indian veteran who has not been in the scheme of things for the national side after the injury he suffered in the ICC World Cup 2023.

A squad to get the feeling of an England tour prior to the main squad

Before the main Test series, the India A team will be playing a couple of practice matches, and the A squad for the tour has already been announced.

Shubman Gill and Sai Sudharsan, apart from the players playing in the IPL Playoffs, will join the A squad after the 1st practice game is done.

Abhimanyu Easwaran has been named the captain of the A squad, and he is among the contenders to take up the 2nd opener's spot in the main squad when the tour starts.

India A squad: Abhimanyu Easwaran (C), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Karun Nair, Dhruv Jurel (VC) (WK), Nitish Kumar Reddy, Shardul Thakur, Ishan Kishan (WK), Manav Suthar, Tanush Kotian, Mukesh Kumar, Akash Deep, Harshit Rana, Anshul Kamboj, Khaleel Ahmed, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Sarfaraz Khan, Tushar Deshpande, Harsh Dubey

Sai Sudharsan's amazing IPL season has also earned him a maiden Test call. Arshdeep Singh has been picked as the left-arm seamer. As for spin options, Ravichandran Ashwin also announced his retirement during India's tour of Australia 2024-25.

That leaves Ravindra Jadeja the only veteran spinner in the side to have had the experience of playing in England. For fast bowling all-rounder, Nitish Kumar Reddy was a part of the squad in Australia. Shardul Thakur has also been added to the A squad.

The 1st Test of the series will be played in Leeds. Both the teams will then move to Birmingham for the 2nd Test from 02nd July. The Home of Cricket, Lord's, will host India and England in the 3rd Test of the series from 10th July.

Old Trafford will witness the two teams battling each other in the 4th Test from July 23. The tour will culminate with the 5th and final Test taking place at the Kennington Oval in London on July 31.

India Test squad for England tour 2025- Shubman Gill (captain), Rishabh Pant (wk and VC), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul, Sai Sudarshan, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Karun Nair, Nitish Reddy, Ravindra Jadeja, Dhruv Jurel (wk), Washington Sundar, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, and Kuldeep Yadav.