Kerala and Karnataka omit Sanju Samson and Manish Pandey from Vijay Hazare Trophy

Sanju Samson has been left out of Kerala’s squad for the Vijay Hazare Trophy beginning December 21. The move comes on the back of an internal decision to include only those players who participated in a preparatory camp in the lead-up to the tournament.

Samson had led Kerala in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT) 2024-25, where they narrowly missed out on qualifying for the knockouts, winning four out of their six matches. Samson, who had originally been named in the 30-member probable list, now finds himself out of the 19-member long list.

ESPNcricinfo understands Samson had written to the association stating his unavailability for the camp, but the KCA has decided to stick to its original decision. With senior batter Sachin Baby also unavailable due to injury he picked up during SMAT, batter Salman Nizar has been named captain for the 50-over competition.

Samson, fresh off two T20I centuries on the tour of South Africa, played in five of Kerala’s six games at SMAT, scoring 135 runs including one half-century.

Kerala squad: Salman Nizar (capt), Rohan Kunnummal, Shoun Roger, Mohammed Azharuddeen (wk), Anand Krishnan, Krishna Prasad, Jalaj Saxena, Aditya Sarwate, Sijomon Joseph, Basil Thampi, Basil NP, Nidheesh MD, Eden Apple Tom, Sharafuddeen, Akhil Scaria, Vishweshwar Suresh, Vaishak Chandran, Ajnas M (wk)

Karnataka ‘move on’ from Manish Pandey

Meanwhile, there’s churn elsewhere with Karnataka seemingly having “moved on” – as per KSCA selection committee chair J Abhiram – from a number of senior players in a bid to reset. Among those not considered is senior batter Manish Pandey.

The KSCA believes Pandey’s exit at this point is purely on form and the possibility of a comeback seems “tough.” Pandey managed just 117 runs in five innings as Karnataka failed to make the SMAT knockouts; they finished fourth in the eight-team pool, losing out to Baroda and Saurashtra.

The association has also gone to the extent of saying Pandey, who was vice-captain to Mayank Agarwal for the first half of Ranji Trophy 2024-25, won’t be considered for the back end of the competition that will resume in January. Pandey managed a solitary half-century in six innings, with Karnataka needing a miracle to qualify for the knockouts.

“We as an association have realized that we need to move on from the players of old and bring in new blood,” Abhiram said. “We cannot live in past glory.”

If Pandey has indeed played his last game, it marks the end of a glorious career in which he was part of two Ranji Trophy-winning squads (2013-14 and 2014-15), apart from winning a number of white-ball championships. Interestingly, Karnataka won their most-recent silverware under his leadership – the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy back-to-back in 2018-19 and 2019-20.

Pandey has 7973 runs in 118 first-class matches at an average of 50.78, with 25 centuries. Overall, he also has over 13,000 runs across the white-ball formats. He played the most-recent of his 68 white-ball games for India in 2021. Last month, he was re-signed by reigning IPL champions Kolkata Knight Riders ahead of the 2025 season.

Pandey’s ouster from Karnataka comes hot on the heels of a number of high-profile exits. K Gowtham, the allrounder, has not been considered across formats since the end of the 2022-23 season despite compelling performances in club cricket as well as the state-run Maharaja T20 Trophy.

R Samarth, the opener, has moved to Uttarakhand to play across formats, something he wasn’t able to do at Karnataka with the selectors considering him as a red-ball specialist. Shreyas Gopal, the legspinner, left for Kerala for a season but has since returned to the Karnataka fold.

It appears now that senior players, including captain Agarwal, will be under close scrutiny from the selection committee should they continue to flounder. “When we won the double-treble, it was a young Karnataka team,” Abhiram said. “We’re banking on youth once again to get us there.”

Karnataka squad: Mayank Agarwal (capt), Shreyas Gopal (vice-capt), S Nikin Jose, KV Aneesh, R Smaran, KL Shrijith, Abhinav Manohar, Hardik Raj, Vyshak Vijaykumar, Vasuki Koushik, Vidyadhar Patil, Kishan Bedare, Abhilash Shetty, Manoj Bhandage, Pravin Dubey, Luvnith Sisodia