The 2025-26 Indian domestic cricket season will kick off with the Duleep Trophy, which will be played from August 28 to September 15. Organised by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), the red-ball tournament returns to its traditional zonal format with six teams: North Zone, South Zone, East Zone, West Zone, Central Zone, and North East Zone.
This season the tournament will be played at the new Centre of Excellence in Bengaluru and will feature India Test captain Shubman Gill along with Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel, Shardul Thakur, Kuldeep Yadav, Arshdeep Singh and Abhimanyu Easwaran, who all were part of the recently concluded Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy.
Players like Shreyas Iyer, Ishan Kishan, and Mohammed Shami, who are eyeing their comeback will also be in action.
Duleep Trophy 2025: Format
Last season, the Duleep Trophy was played in a round-robin format. However, the return to the zonal format marks the comeback of the knockouts.
Four teams, Central, East, North and NorthEast, will play the quarterfinal round. On the other hand, the finalists of the previous zonal edition (2023) – South Zone and West Zone – have received direct entry to the semifinals, facing the winners of the quarterfinals.
Duleep Trophy 2025: Full Schedule
Quarter-finals
August 28-31, 2025: North Zone vs East Zone – Venue: BCCI COE Ground 1, Bengaluru
August 28-31, 2025: Central Zone vs North East Zone – Venue: BCCI COE Ground 2, Bengaluru
Semi-finals
September 4-7, 2025: South Zone vs Winner QF1 – Venue: BCCI COE Ground 1, Bengaluru
September 4-7, 2025: North Zone vs Winner QF2 – Venue: BCCI COE Ground 2, Bengaluru
Final
September 11-15, 2025: Final – Venue: BCCI COE Ground 1, Bengaluru
Duleep Trophy 2025 Squads
South Zone squad: Tilak Varma (c), Mohammed Azharuddeen (vc), Tanmay Agarwal, Devdutt Padikkal, Mohit Kale, Salman Nizar, Narayan Jagadeesan, Tripurana Vijay, R Sai Kishore, Tanay Thyagarajan, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Nidheesh MD, Ricky Bhui, Basil NP, Gurjapneet Singh, Snehal Kauthankar.
East Zone squad: Ishan Kishan (c), Abhimanyu Easwaran (vc), Sandeep Patnaik, Virat Singh, Denish Das, Sridam Paul, Sharandeep Singh, Kumar Kushagra, Riyan Parag, Utkarsh Singh, Manishi, Suraj Sindhu Jaiswal, Mukesh Kumar, Akash Deep, Mohammed Shami.
West Zone squad: Shardul Thakur (c), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Aarya Desai, Harvik Desai (wicket-keeper), Shreyas Iyer, Sarfaraz Khan, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Jaymeet Patel, Manan Hingrajia, Saurabh Nawale (wicket-keeper), Shams Mulani, Tanush Kotian, Dharmandrasinh Jadeja, Tushar Deshpande, Arzan Nagwaswala
North Zone squad: Shubman Gill (c), Shubham Khajuria, Ankit Kumar (vc), Ayush Badoni, Yash Dhull, Ankit Kalsi, Nishant Sandhu, Sahil Lotra, Mayank Dagar, Yudhvir Singh Charak, Arshdeep Singh, Harshit Rana, Anshul Kamboj, Auqib Nabi, Kanhaiya Wadhawan.
Central Zone squad: Dhruv Jurel (c/wk), Rajat Patidar, Aryan Juyal, Danish Malewar, Sanjeet Desai, Kuldeep Yadav, Aditya Thakare, Deepak Chahar, Saransh Jain, Ayush Pandey, Shubham Sharma, Yash Rathod, Harsh Dubey, Manav Suthar, Khaleel Ahmed
North East Zone squad: Yet to be announced