Mohammed Shami included in Bengal squad for Vijay Hazare Trophy

After regaining match fitness in the Ranji Trophy and, more recently, in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT), Mohammed Shami continues on his road to complete recovery as he was named in Bengal's squad for the Vijay Hazare Trophy (VHT). 

The India pacer finished with 11 wickets in SMAT. He returned to competitive cricket after a one-year hiatus following surgery on his right heel. 

"India star pacers Mohammed Shami and Mukesh Kumar will form a strong Bengal bowling attack while the young Sudip Kumar Gharami will lead the team in the forthcoming Vijay Hazare Trophy," a Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) release said on December 14 (Saturday).

Bengal will begin their campaign against Delhi in Hyderabad on December 21.

Due to his injury, Shami was not included in India's Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) squad. He is still waiting for clearance from the Sports Science wing of the BCCI's new Bengaluru-based Centre of Excellence. India skipper Rohit Sharma, too, recently said that the team management will not rush Shami into Test cricket.

In fact, there is a consensus among the stakeholders that T20 cricket is not an ideal indicator of whether a player is fit enough to play Test cricket. As things stand, there are no discussions of the possibility of having Shami in Australia for the Test series.

Bengal's squad for VHT: Sudip Kumar Gharami (C), Mohammad Shami, Anustup Majumdar, Abhishek Porel (wk), Sudip Chatterjee, Karan Lal, Shakir Habib Gandhi (wk), Sumanta Gupta, Subham Chatterjee, Ranjot Singh Khaira, Pradipta Pramanik, Kaushik Maity, Vikas Singh (Sr), Mukesh Kumar, Saksham Chaudhary, Rohit Kumar, Md Kaif, Suraj Sindhu Jaiswal, Sayan Ghosh and Kanishk Seth