Suresh Raina picks India playing 11 for 2025 Champions Trophy; leaves out KL Rahul and Mohammed Shami

Former Indian batter Suresh Raina has picked his ideal playing XI for Team India to start the 2025 Champions Trophy, which begins on February 19. The Men in Blue will be part of Group A in the eight-team competition with Pakistan, New Zealand, and Bangladesh.

Raina's 11 surprisingly excluded ace pacer Mohammed Shami and wicketkeeper-batter KL Rahul - two of India's star performers in their last ICC ODI event, the 2023 World Cup. Shami recently returned to the side in the England series after over a year on the sidelines due to injury.

The 34-year-old did not look to be at his menacing best, picking up only two wickets in as many games despite India's 3-0 whitewash of England in the ODI series. Meanwhile, Rahul was demoted to No. 6 in the opening two ODIs of the series before returning to No. 5 for the final encounter.

Despite a quickfire 40 in the series finale, he finished with only 52 runs in three innings at an average of under 18. The duo apart, Raina also excluded spinners Varun Chakravarthy and Washington Sundar in his playing XI from the 15-member squad for the Champions Trophy in a Star Sports show (via The Times of India).

Suresh Raina's Team India playing XI for 2025 Champions Trophy

Rohit Sharma (c), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant (wk), Axar Patel, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Arshdeep Singh, Harshit Rana, Kuldeep Yadav

"Kuldeep Yadav is going to be very important" - Suresh Raina

Kuldeep played two of the three ODIs in the recent England series [Credit: Getty]

Suresh Raina highlighted the importance of left-arm chinaman bowler Kuldeep Yadav in India's group-stage outings of the Champions Trophy against Pakistan and New Zealand.

The 30-year-old returned from injury in the recently concluded England series, picking up two wickets in the two ODI games he played.

"Kuldeep Yadav is going to be very important because Axar Patel and Ravindra Jadeja contain well in the middle overs, bowling stump to stump; and then Kuldeep can bring in his mystery spin, particularly against Pakistan who play the sweep shot well...New Zealand have a lot of left-handers. The kind of pressure Kuldeep can create and force the batters to go for the big shot, it can lead to wickets," said Raina on Star Sports [via The Times of India].

Kuldeep has been in red-hot ODI form since the start of 2023, picking up 55 wickets in 35 matches at an average of 21.76 and an economy of 4.51. He also played a massive role in India's 2024 T20 World Cup triumph and 2023 ODI World Cup final run.