The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has announced the India squad for the Men’s T20 World Cup 2026, where Shubman Gill and Jitesh Sharma have been dropped from the squad.

In Shubman Gill’s absence, Axar Patel has been named as the vice-captain for the tournament.

Meanwhile, Wk-batter Ishan Kishan and Rinku Singh have been added to the regular squad for the upcoming marquee event. India will be entering with a power-packed bowling attack with Jasprit Bumrah, Arsheep Singh and Harshi Rana as three frontline pacers.

Meanwhile, Varun Chakravarthy and Kuldeep Yadav were the two frontline spinners, joined by Axar Patel and Washington Sundar.

On the other hand, Shivam Dube and Hardik Pandya will be the seam-bowling all-rounder to go with a settled batting line-up with Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Varma and Rinku Singh.

Along with them, aggressive batter Abhishek Sharma and wicket-keepers Sanju Samson and Ishan Kishan have been named in the India squad.

The same will be entering the five-match T20I series against New Zealand. Speaking on the squad selection, BCCI selector Ajit Agarkar said, “It’s more to do with the combination that we want to play, or what the team management is comfortable with playing.”

“Their thoughts are… who’s going to bat at the top? Abhishek, obviously, has done what he has done over the last year. And we felt the keeper at the top at this point gives us a lot more solidity than anywhere else in the team to play different combinations,” he added.

“There are only 15 that we could have picked. Someone has to miss out. It’s him. It’s not because he’s not a good player. Again, Jitesh hasn’t done too much wrong. These are the combinations that the team management is looking for.”

Shubman Gill who replaced Sanju Samson in the Xl when named as the vice captain, has not scored a single half-century in the 15 innings at the top.

He has scored 291 runs at a strike rate of 137.26. He missed the final T20I against South Africa at a strike rate of 137.26. In his absence, Sanju Samson scored 37 runs off 22 deliveries in his absence.

Speaking on the Gill’s exclusion, Suryakumar Yadav said, “It’s not about his form or anything. It’s just about the combination right now. We wanted to have a keeper at the top. We wanted to have someone like Rinku Singh or maybe a Washington Sundar later on, to have a different combination. So that’s why we brought in that extra wicketkeeper at the top.”

“And he’s a terrific player. And there’s no question about that. The only thing is that the situation is such that we need a keeper at the top of the order to have two-three good combinations which can win us the World Cup.”

India will play their opener match of the T20 World Cup 2026 against United States on February 07 at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai.

India Squad for NZ T20Is and T20 World Cup: Suryakumar Yadav (c), Abhishek Sharma, Sanju Samson (wk), Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel (vc), Rinku Singh, Jasprit Bumrah, Harshit Rana, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav, Varun Chakaravarthy, Washington Sundar, Ishan Kishan (wk)