Vaibhav Sooryavanshi headlines India’s probable squad for Asian Games:Suryakumar Yadav, Shubman Gill excluded, BCCI pick 30-players longlist

One of the brightest prospects in Indian cricket, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi has been included in the 30-man longlist for the Asian Games 2026 probables. Whereas, current ODI and Test captain Shubman Gill, as well as T20I captain Suryakumar Yadav have both been left out. The BCCI submitted a list of 30 probables to the Indian Olympic Association (IOA), for the Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya from September 19 to October 4. For the unversed, the board will pick a second string squad for the Asian Games as they global extravaganza will overlap with the white-ball series against West Indies at home. Between September 27 to October 17, West Indies will play three ODIs and five T20Is against India, thus Shubman Gill and Suryakumar Yadav have been left out of the Asian Games probables list. Another reason for Surya’s exclusion, as per PTI is that the T20 World Cup 2026 winning captain is no longer in the larger scheme of things as far as 2028 Olympic Games and the next T20 World Cup is concerned, and his name not featuring in the Asian Games longlist is a no-brainer. Vaibhav Sooryavanshi expected to make senior India debut soon? After lighting up the IPL 2026 season with his heroics, Vaibhav, 15, who scored 776 runs in 16 matches this season has been selected in the probables for the second string side which will play in the Asian Games. The men’s cricket event at the Asian Games will take place between September 24 to October 3, forcing the selectors to create a bigger pool to pick two teams. The likes of Shreyas Iyer, Sanju Samson or Tilak Verma may be seen leading the Indian team in the Asian Games. Jasprit Bumrah has also been named in the 30-man longlist, but he may not feature in the Asian Games, since his priorities would be the ODI series ahead of next year’s ODI World Cup. Who all made the cut for Asian Games? Harshit Rana is expected to be fit by then and has been kept in the long-list along with Prasidh Krishna and Arshdeep Singh. Among spinners, the frontline slow bowlers Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar and Harsh Dubey have made it to the list, but only two of the four are expected to be picked. The other two will play the Windies series. Surprisingly, the only prominent non-performer to make the list is gold medal-winning skipper from the Hangzhou edition, Ruturaj Gaikwad. India’s probable squad for Asian Games: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Abhishek Sharma, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Ishan Kishan, Sanju Samson (wk), Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant (wk), Hardik Pandya, Rinku Singh, Tilak Varma, Jasprit Bumrah, Axar Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Prasidh Krishna, Varun Chakravarthy, Anukul Roy, Ayush Badoni, Harsh Dubey, Dhruv Jurel, Khaleel Ahmed, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ravi Bishnoi, Shahbaz Ahmed, Shivam Dube, Vipraj Nigam Nigam, Harshit Rana, Yash Thakur, Washington Sundar.