Photo Credit: USA Cricket
- USA Cricket Men’s Under 19 Squad announced that will represent Team USA in attempt to qualify for the ICC Men’s U19 Cricket World Cup
- Final dates for ICC Americas Regional U19 CWC Qualifier still to be confirmed by ICC due to COVID-19 related travel challenges
USA Cricket today announced the 14-player squad to play in the Regional Americas ICC Under 19 Men’s Cricket World Cup Qualifier. The event is the final step in the qualification pathway to the ICC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup scheduled for January-February 2022 in the West Indies.
The U19 Cricket World Cup has been a breeding ground for many current and former international players at ICC Full Member and Associate Member levels. Those players almost always point to the vital part that the event played in their growth as players. Even more so, nearly all current Full Members have captains in at least one format that are products of their national Under 19 team. Qualifying for the 2022 event, the first time since 2010, and especially in the West Indies, would be a considerable boost to the continued growth of the game in the United States by providing a clear focus for the USA’s junior and youth cricketers.
The Men’s Under 19 Selection Panel had a challenging task at the recent U19 Selection and Training Camp in the Bay Area to narrow down the previous 26-player National Training Group to the 14 players and four reserves. Performances at both the National Championships and the Camp were taken into account in addition to USA Cricket’s other performance criteria of attitude, fitness, and skills. As always, the Selection Panel will continue to monitor the performance of all players, even those who have missed out on selection, over coming months in local and domestic tournaments.
USA Cricket has made provisional plans for another training camp to be staged in Houston during the summer, which will be confirmed once the ICC has been able to provide greater certainty around the timing of the event.
USA Cricket will announce the Captain and Vice-Captain for the squad in due course.
USA Cricket U19 Men’s Head Coach, Kevin Darlington, said, “The squad selected is strong on all fronts, with batters who have performed at senior level, exciting young pace bowlers, a variety of spin options, and genuine all-rounders who can hold their place in the team in more than one skill area.
We have a very talented group of individual players, but as we all know, that is just part of the equation that makes a successful team. The proposed camp in Houston will allow us to work closely with the final group of players to develop the cohesion, culture, and spirit necessary to get through the Qualifier challenges that lie ahead. I’m looking forward to getting this group together again soon, so they can build on the relationships and partnerships that started to develop at the previous camp.”
Chairman of the Men’s U19 Selection Panel, Amer Afzaluddin, added, “We are proud, particularly in these times of COVID, that we’ve been able to run a robust selection process so far, with the U19 National Championship and the U19 Selection and Training Camp both being extremely successful. These two opportunities have allowed the selectors to get a wealth of information about each player in making our final decisions. We know the potential strength of this group and have complete confidence in their ability and character to do the job at hand.”
USA Cricket Operations Director, Richard Done, said, “We are in regular contact with the ICC and the participating countries about the logistical challenges of staging this event in the USA, and will leave no stone unturned from our side to ensure that the event does indeed go ahead. This is an absolute priority for us, but international travel involving minors does create additional challenges which we will need to work through for the ICC to be able to confirm that the event can go ahead.”
The 14 players selected (plus four reserve players) in alphabetical order are:
| USA U19 Team | Zone |
| Abhiram Bolisetty | South Zone |
| Abhiram Valisammagari | South West Zone |
| Ali Sheikh | South West Zone |
| Hisham Ali | Colts |
| Ishan Sharma | Mid-Atlantic Zone |
| Rehman Dar | South West Zone |
| Ritwik Behera | Mid-Atlantic Zone |
| Rohan Phadke | South Zone |
| Rohan Posanipally | West Zone Reds |
| Saiteja Mukkamalla | Mid-Atlantic Zone |
| Sanjay Krishnamurthy | West Zone Reds |
| Skanda Rohit Sharma | West Zone Reds |
| Slade-Lee Van Staden | Colts |
| Yasir Mohammad | Mid-Atlantic Zone |
| Reserves | |
| Ajay Immadi | West Zone Reds |
| Mihir Cherukupalli | South West Zone |
| Rahul Jariwala | West Zone Reds |
| Tejas Vishal | Midwest Zone |
Name of Author: USA Cricket
USA Cricket (USAC) is the governing body for cricket in the United States, overseeing the national men’s, women’s, and youth teams. It also manages Major League Cricket, the premier domestic Twenty20 competition in the U.S.
