Mohammed Shami’s name has re-appeared on a Bengal squad list, a quiet yet welcome step for the seamer after what has felt like an endless cycle of rehab, surgery and patchy form.
The state selectors have put together a 50-strong group of probables for the new domestic season and Shami, 34, is on it. If all goes smoothly he could turn out for East Zone in the Duleep Trophy, scheduled to start on 28 August, now restored to its old inter-zonal format. That tournament would be his first competitive outing since the 2025 IPL.
A quick recap of the recent past explains why his return matters. Shami last played international cricket during the Champions Trophy, held earlier this year. India lifted the title after defeating New Zealand, and Shami took nine wickets in five matches – tied with Varun Chakravarthy for India’s best haul – but his economy rate, 5.68, raised eyebrows. Two months later, he had an even harder time at Sunrisers Hyderabad, managing six wickets in nine innings and conceding more than eleven an over.
Those numbers, while stark, sit against a backdrop of injuries. An ankle operation, followed by knee niggles, forced Shami to miss the entire second half of 2024. He re-emerged for Bengal late that year and squeezed in a T20I series against England last January, his first India appearance since the 2023 ODI World Cup final.
Speaking at the selection meeting, a Bengal official simply noted, “If he’s fit, he plays. It’s really that straightforward.” The bowler himself has stayed mostly silent, apart from a brief social-media post last week: “Training hard, one day at a time.”
The rest of Bengal’s provisional list holds no real surprises: Abhimanyu Easwaran, Akash Deep, Mukesh Kumar, Shahbaz Ahmed and wicketkeeper Abishek Porel are all present and expected to form the core of the side.
For now, Shami’s task is uncomplicated but never easy: prove fitness, find rhythm, and, in his own words, “get back to doing the simple things right.” The next six weeks should tell us whether that comeback is around the corner or still some distance away.
