Vijay Hazare Trophy 2025-26: Top four title contenders analysed based on squad strength, form, and recent domestic performances.
As the 2025/26 Indian domestic season is all heated up. The spotlight has now shifted to the Vijay Hazare Trophy (VHT), India’s premier 50-over tournament. This competition is often the stepping stone for players who dream of playing ODI cricket for India.
The 38 participating teams are divided into Elite and Plate Groups, and the competition follows the league-cum-knockout format. So, every game in the tournament is important for a team and it tests their depth.
In this article, we analyse which four of these teams have a strong core to reach the final stages of the tournament and are strong title contenders.
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Haryana (HCA)
Haryana is turning out to be an absolute force when it comes to white-ball cricket in the Indian domestic circuit. After winning the Vijay Hazare Trophy, Haryana reached the finals of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy in the current season.
Coming to the squad, they have a good mix of youth and experience for the VHT, led by Ankit Kumar. Ankit, a top-order batter, has led the team from the front in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT), finishing as the second-highest run-getter with 448 runs, only behind Ishan Kishan.
They also have an experienced domestic top-order batter in Himanshu Rana and a young keeper-batter, Yashvardhan Dalal, who was the fourth-highest run-scorer in SMAT 2025 with 398 runs. Haryana boasts IPL veteran Rahul Tewatia in their ranks, the impressive Nishant Sandhu as their premier all-rounder.
In the bowling department, India’s Test pacer will lead the pace attack that also has the hard-hitting lower-order batter cum pace bowler in Samath Jakkar. The latter was the second-highest wicket-taker for Haryana in SMAT with 14 scalps.
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Karnataka (KSCA)
The joint most successful team in the VHT, with five titles, Karnataka, will be eyeing to create history this year by capturing their sixth title and defending it. They are arguably the most dominant white-ball domestic side in India.
Karnataka will be buoyed by the return of their veteran batter Karun Nair, who scored a whopping 779 runs in the last edition of VHT while playing for Vidarbha. Among the emerging youngsters, they have the young left-handed batter Smaran Ravichandran, who is touted to be the next big thing in the domestic circuit.
Apart from them, Karnataka have a batting order comprising India internationals like Mayank Agarwal, KL Rahul, and Devdutt Padikkal.
To complete the team, their bowling is equally strong with bowlers like Prasidh Krishna, Vyshak Vijayakumar, and Shreyas Gopal. Therefore, Karnataka are true title-contender.
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Vidarbha (VCA)
Vidarbha was the runners-up in the last edition of VHT, primarily riding on the spectacular form of their then-batter Karun Nair. Nachiket Bhute, who was leading wicket-taker for Vidarbha in 2024/25 with 17 scalps is once again in their line-up as is skipper Harsh Dubey who picked 14 wickets.
In the batting department, they have domestic stalwarts like Ravikumar Samrath, Dhruv Shorey, Shubham Duney and young prolific scorer, Yash Rathod. Likewise, in bowling, Darshan Nalkande, who has knack of picking wickets in white-ball cricket will lead the pace attack along with IPL experienced pacer in Yash Thakur.
While Vidarbha may not have the best of records when it comes to T20 cricket, they have been great in the long format of the games. With this sqaud, the former Ranji Trophy champions can go a long way in their bid to win the VHT for the first time.
Mumbai (MCA)
Mumbai will aim to join Karnataka and Tamil Nadu as the joint most successful team in VHT history if they win this tournament. They played good cricket in 2025/26 domestic season by starting Ranji Trophy campaign on a solid note and narrowly missing out on making the final in SMAT.
In their VHT squad, they have best of current Indian players in their ranks, like Shreyas Iyer, Rohit Sharma, Sarfaraz Khan, and Yashavi Jaiswal, led by all-rounder Shardul Thakur. The presence of these players will definitely boost the chances of winning the title for the first time in 2020/21 edition.
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