Aditya Tare favourite to lead Mumbai for entire season

Having missed out on an opportunity to play in the Karnataka State Cricket Association's Shafi Dara Shah Cricket Tournament as a preparation for the season ahead, Mumbai will jump into action in the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association's Buchi Babu tournament starting on August 16.

On Thursday, the Mumbai selectors will sit to pick the team for Buchi Babu comprising a mix of Ranji Trophy and U-23 players that will serve as a warm-up for the season.

The topmost agenda for the selection committee meeting would be to name the Mumbai captain for the season. It is more likely that the selectors would go with Aditya Tare, who impressed with his captaincy skills after taking over from Suryakumar Yadav in the middle of last season.

In the previous season, Yadav stepped down from captaincy due to issues on and off the field. Tare took over from Yadav and guided Mumbai into semifinals before bowing out to eventual champions Karnataka.

"This is an important tournament for us as far as preparation is concerned. We missed Shafi Darashah tourney because we could not field our team due to elections. Not just the Buchi Babu tournament, we will also play matches elsewhere too as part of preparations," said an MCA official. "As far as captain is concerned, Tare is likely to continue as captain of the team. This time we decided to have a captain for the whole season."