Kolkata Club Cricket Exclusive: East Bengal create a strong squad for 2024-25 season; Writtick Chatterjee to lead

With the 2024-25 cricket season approaching, Kolkata club cricket's one of the most successful and oldest clubs East Bengal have won the early battle by creating a strong squad before the start of the season. Though they have kept most of the players from the last season, coach Abdul Monayem and team management decided to hand over the captaincy to all-rounder Writtick Chatterjee. Meantime, another all-rounder Sandipan Das has been given the role of his deputy for the next season.

Writtick Chatterjee had a great season with East Bengal with bat and ball and ended with a stellar performance in the Bengal Pro T20 league where he won the "Player of the Tournament", "Best All-rounder" and "Highest Scorer award". East Bengal rewarded him with the captaincy while bringing former Bhawanipore captain Sandipan Das as his deputy.

Both Chatterjee and Das played a lot of cricket together and have the experience of leading Bhawanipore to glory in past. Sandipan also was the captain of the Bengal U-19 and U-23 where Chatterjee played under him and East Bengal will look to take advantage of the camaraderie they have.

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Along with them, their other partner in crime opener and hard-hitter Abhishek Das will be continuing as an East Bengal player but not as captain this season. Talented wicket-keeper batter Sourav Paul, who made his first-class debut last season, will be Abhishek's partner at the top of the order.

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Satyaki Dutta, who was named East Bengal's cricketer of the season 2023-24, will also continue his journey in Red and Gold. Agniv Pan's entry from Bhawanipore will make the batting lineup stronger along with the presence of Arindam Ghosh, all-rounder Ayan Bhattacharjee and youngster Shashank Singh. Amitoze Singh will continue to be their premier outstation player this season. 

While their batting strength remained nearly the same, they have made a few changes in the bowling lineup including Vikash Singh from Kalighat, Bengal's of most promising pacer Suraj Sindhu Jaiswal from Customs, and left-arm pacer Kanishk Seth from Mohun Bagan. Moreover, they have added another young pacer Syed Irfan Aftab to make their pace battery one of the strongest in Kolkata Club Cricket.

Medium pacers Akash Ghatak and Sumit Mahanta were kept in the squad alongside left-arm spinner Shreyan Chakraborty. Senior players Susanta Das and Satyabrata Murmu will also be donning the East Bengal jersey this season.

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East Bengal squad for 2024-25 season

Writtick Chatterjee (C), Sandipan Das (VC), Agniv Pan (wk), Sourav Paul (wk), Abhishek Das, Amitoze Singh, Satyaki Dutta, Ayan Bhattacharya, Sruaj Sindhu Jaiswal, Syed Irfan Aftab, Kanishk Seth, Vikash Singh, Shreyan Chakraborty, Sumit Mahanta, Shashank Singh, Ayan Gupta, Akash Ghatak, Arindam Ghosh, Iman Dutta, Satyabrata Murmu, Susanta Das.

Coach: Abdul Monayem.