On January 18, the Champions Trophy squad selection meeting took place for almost two hours, and reports are saying that BCCI Chief Selector Ajit Agarkar had rejected a few of the suggestions from Head Coach Gautam Gambhir. After the meeting, Agarkar and captain Rohit Sharma attended the press conference and declared the 15-member squad. According to a report by Dainik Jagran, Agarkar denied two key proposals from Gambhir. The first one was to include Sanju Samson as the backup wicketkeeper in the squad behind KL Rahul. However, Agarkar voted for Rishabh Pant and also clarified in the press conference that he will be the primary keeper for the team. Read also: Sanju Samson Skips Kerala Camp, Faces Criticism from KCA Shubhman Gill over Hardik Pandya as the deputy The second proposal that was turned down was to appoint Hardik Pandya as the vice captain. It was the joint decision from both Agarkar and Rohit to appoint the 25-year-old Shubman Gill as the vice captain. Shubman Gill was appointed vice captain during the Sri Lanka tour last year, got back the position in the marquee tournament. Hardik, who served as vice captain in both the 2023 Cricket World Cup and 2024 T20 World Cup, was sidelined after Suryakumar Yadav took over as India's full-time T20I captain. Recently, Axar Patel was named vice captain for the upcoming five-match T20I series against England. India squad for the Champions Trophy 2025: Rohit Sharma (C), Shubman Gill (VC), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (wk), Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh, Mohammad Shami, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rishabh Pant (wk), Ravindra Jadeja. *Harshit Rana will play in the ODI series against England, keeping Jasprit Bumrah's fitness concern.