India T20I captain Suryakumar Yadav has confirmed his availability to play one game for Mumbai in the upcoming Buchi Babu Invitational multi-day tournament this year.
Suryakumar will feature in the second match for Mumbai CA XI against Tamil Nadu Cricket Association XI at Coimbatore, to be played from August 27-30.
Test specialist Sarfaraz Khan has been named the captain of the Mumbai side and Suryakumar, who has also led the domestic giants in the past, will feature as a player since he wants to feature in all formats.
The Indian players will now have a break as the next assignment will be against Bangladesh — a two-match Test series starting on September 19 in Chennai.
“Suryakumar will play the second match for Mumbai,” an official from the Mumbai Cricket Association said on Wednesday.
The tournament will be held at four venues in Tamil Nadu — Tirunelveli, Salem, Coimbatore and Natham — this year.
Another MCA official told PTI on the conditions of anonymity, “Surya wants to play in all three formats for India and as he has always been available for Mumbai whenever free, it won’t be otherwise this year too.”
“He will play tourneys like Buchi Babu, KSCA (Gold Cup) apart from Ranji Trophy where his presence will also motivate the youngsters in the team,” an MCA source told PTI on conditions of anonymity.
The Buchi Babu Invitational tournament used to be a season opener in Indian domestic cricket and all Test stars would turn up at the start of the season.
The tournament lost its sheen in recent years failing to attract big names. However, the last players among those who played while still being India captains were Krishnamachari Srikkanth and Mohammad Azharuddin.
Even Sourav Ganguly, who was dropped by the then India head coach Greg Chappell, had played Buchi Babu during his comeback trial in mid-2000s.
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