Dropping Rohit Sharma for the final Test between India and Australia wasn’t solely Gautam Gambhir’s call, RevSportz understands. It was taken in consultation with chief selector Ajit Agarkar, who had a conversation with the captain after the Indian team landed in Sydney. Other members of the selection panel, too, were kept in the loop.
Rohit missed the first Test in Perth, staying back in India for the birth of his second child. India won that game under Jasprit Bumrah’s captaincy. After joining the team, Rohit has played three Tests, scoring just 31 runs from five innings at an average of 6.20. His poor form, coupled with India’s defeats in Adelaide and Melbourne – rain saved the tourists in Brisbane – made his position almost untenable. The skipper, it is learnt, still wanted to play in Sydney before taking a call on his red-ball future at the end of the series. But Gambhir, the team’s head coach, preferred to bring Shubman Gill back for the must-win game. If India win in Sydney, they will retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy and also have an outside chance to qualify for the World Test Championship (WTC) final.
That, though, is the short-term goal. Long-term, Indian cricket has been bracing itself for transition. This is going to be a season of upheaval and to paraphrase Steve Coll, the Pulitzer-winning former Washington Post reporter, thunderclaps would be disgorged by the racing skies. If Rohit can be dropped mid-series, then no one is safe.
Virat Kohli has been going through an elongated lean patch by his very lofty standards and unless there’s a second wind, a call might be taken before India’s next Test assignment in England, starting in June. Kohli has scored a century in the ongoing series, but a tally of 167 runs from seven innings at an average of 27.83 attests to inconsistency. The 36-year-old, though, is still one of the fittest cricketers in the side and there’s also a school of thought that his presence would help the new captain during his bedding-in period. In all likelihood, this is going to be Bumrah’s team in the next WTC cycle, with Gill as his deputy.
As regards Gambhir’s future, he has been brought in with an eye on transition and that makes his job safe for the moment. However, a failure in the Champions Trophy might see a rejig of the support staff.