Sarandeep Singh retained as Delhi senior men's team head coach for upcoming season

New Delhi, Sep 27 (IANS) Former India off-spinner and national selector Sarandeep Singh has been retained as the head coach of Delhi’s senior men’s team for the upcoming domestic season.

Sarandeep, who played three Tests and five ODIs for India from 2000 to 2003, was appointed to the role by the three-member Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC) of the DDCA and has now been retained. Sarandeep will be assisted by Kuldeep Rawat, V. Aravind, and Kshitiz Sharma, who comes in place of Bantu Singh.

K.P. Bhaskar retains his place in the three-member senior men’s selection panel alongside Yashpal Sharma and Manu Nayar. The Delhi senior men’s side had failed to qualify for the Ranji Trophy and Vijay Hazare Trophy knockouts stage, while managing to reach the quarterfinals of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy.

Former India women’s cricketer Reema Malhotra, who was the mentor of the state women’s team, is now the chairperson of the selection committee. The appointment of Reema, who played a Test, 41 ODIs, and 22 T20Is for India from 2003 to 2013, to the chief selectors’ role is an indication that her predecessor, former India all-rounder Amita Sharma, could head to the national women’s selection committee.

Deepti Dhyani, coach of India women’s opener Pratika Rawal, will be the new head coach of the Delhi senior women’s team, and will be assisted by Gautam Vadhera (batting), Ashish Malhotra (bowling), and Mandeep Kaur (fielding).

Devender Sharma, the childhood coach of Rishabh Pant and Mayank Yadav at the iconic Sonnet Club, has been retained as a member of the junior women’s selection committee, alongside chairperson Tilak Raj Sharma and Sushma Chaudhary. In the last domestic season, the Delhi women’s team reached the knockouts stage in three competitions and went on to win the U23 T20 Trophy.

Meanwhile, Bantu and Gursharan Singh have been named chief batting coaches of the women’s and men’s teams, respectively, in the High Performance Group. They will be assisted by Kailash Rawat and Sumit Dogra, respectively. Interestingly, the mentors introduced for the Delhi state cricket teams last year have no mention for the 2025/26 season.

--IANS

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