The transition has begun. Finally. The World Test Championship (WTC) debacle had made it kind of inevitable and the selection committee led by Shib Sundar Das has finally taken some very important calls.
My three main newspoints coming out of the meeting: it is the end of the road for Cheteshwar Pujara and, barring a miracle, we won’t see him play for India again. Two, Yashasvi Jaiswal, with a domestic average of 80 and an array of shots that dazzled one and all, has now been included and could well make his debut in the West Indies. Jaiswal is a talent that couldn’t be held back, and is one for the future. And it is time we stop the pani-puri narrative. It is just about ability, and he doesn’t need sympathy from anyone. He is special because he has a unique set of skills, not because he once helped sell pani-puri. Finally, it could well be that the selectors have called time on Umesh Yadav’s career, and have now turned their focus on Mukesh Kumar who, if groomed well, could well be a Mohammed Shami in the making.
The fourth newspoint, if we can call it as such, is the return of Ajinkya Rahane as vice-captain. Frankly, the selectors could have gone to R Ashwin and it was time he was rewarded with the vice-captaincy. To go to Rahane, despite his proven leadership ability, after the WTC final, where he made a very good comeback, overlooking Ashwin seems harsh on the premier spinner. While Rahane is a deserving choice and has won India one of the greatest series ever, one wonders what Ashwin needs to do to land a leadership role in Test cricket. And rewarding Ashwin would have also signalled a kind of acknowledgment that India made a mistake by dropping him at The Oval.
The rest of the players picked are very much on expected lines. To the 50-overs format first, perhaps more important in the context of the World Cup, which is just months away. Rohit leads a 17-member squad to the Caribbean and when we add Jasprit Bumrah, Shreyas Iyer and KL Rahul to the team, we have the 20 most likely to form the core for the most important tournament on Indian soil in years. The return of Sanju Samson could mean a final lifeline for the talented stumper and is a welcome inclusion. He deserves one last opportunity and could well make an impact if he does justice to his potential. The other interesting inclusions are Umran Malik and Mukesh Kumar. Malik with his express pace could just be the X-factor Rohit needs, and Mukesh, included in both Tests and ODIs, has the ability to bowl wicket-taking balls at any point in the game.
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For the Test team, as we have already written in a separate piece, it is the end of Pujara and perhaps rightly so. Despite scoring loads of runs in county cricket, Pujara hasn’t contributed much in Tests, and if his hundred and 90 against Bangladesh are taken out of the picture, his returns are extremely modest in the last three years. I will remember Pujara for the twin tours of Australia where he chose pain over getting out and played a stellar hand for India. He was prepared to look ugly and was the best Indian batter in 2018 by a mile. In 2021, he provided the solidity that India needed for the flamboyance of Pant to take centre stage. The perfect support cast. It has been a very good career, but all good things do have an expiry date as well.
Looking at the team, one expects Jaiswal to get the nod ahead of Ruturaj Gaikwad, and perhaps bat at No. 3, a position he has made his own for Mumbai. And it could well be that Ruturaj is in the team to get him ready for when Rohit decides to move on from Test cricket. In such a scenario, it could be Ruturaj and Gill at the top, with Jaiswal at No. 3, who take India’s batting forward. The other scenario is equally interesting. Ruturaj could open with Jaiswal, with Gill at No. 4 when the great Virat Kohli decides to call it a day. In either scenario, I see Jaiswal joining Gill as the two most exciting batting prospects for India in the next five years. The phasing out has to happen gradually and a start has been made with the next WTC cycle in mind.
A tour to the Caribbean, which doesn’t have much traction otherwise, will now turn interesting to see how these youngsters make the transition to the big league. It is interesting that the selectors decided to embrace change, which was much needed, on the day when India had won the ICC Champions Trophy 10 years back, the last ICC tournament win. Could this day mark a new beginning for Indian cricket?
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