Sunil Gavaskar . (Photo Source: WILLIAM WEST/AFP via Getty Images)
The tour of the West Indies in July-August will kick off team India’s third World Test Championship (WTC) cycle 2023-25. Cheteshwar Pujara, Mohammed Shami, and Umesh Yadav were omitted from the squad for the two-match Test series following their defeat against Australia in the 2023 WTC final at The Oval in London. Meanwhile, three youngsters, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Mukesh Kumar, received their call-ups in the longest format of the game.
Rohit Sharma will continue to lead the team and will be joined by Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, and Ravindra Jadeja, among other veteran players. Meanwhile, former India batter Sunil Gavaskar believes the West Indies tour was a fantastic opportunity for the team management to experiment and test the next generation of Test cricketers. In light of their recent performances, he believes the senior players in the squad are no longer the same force.
“There was a very good chance to try and look at the next rung of cricketers. Because if there was any tour where you could have made some sort of experiments, it was the West Indies. They are not the same force anymore. Therefore, blooding in the younger players would have been the right way,” Gavaskar told Sports Today.
I would have only wanted the senior players to focus on white-ball cricket: Gavaskar
Gavaskar went on to say that the WTC is over and that the next important event to focus on is the 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup, which will be held in India in October. The 73-year-old also stated that the ‘big boys’ should have been given a total break from Test cricket. He added that since they’d been playing non-stop since the 2022 T20 World Cup, he wanted the senior players to solely focus on white-ball cricket for the time being.
“The WTC is gone, we missed out there but the next big thing is the ODI World Cup. I would have preferred the big boys to be given a complete break from Test cricket. Look at only the 50-over format and maybe T20s too as it is the abbreviated version. I would have only wanted them to focus on white-ball cricket,” the former cricketer said.
Furthermore, he said they have been playing non-stop cricket since October-November last year. He also stated they need a complete break from red-ball cricket because they don’t get many long breaks apart from injury breaks. He added that if management has granted Shami a break, perhaps the others will as well.
“They have been playing non-stop cricket since October-November last year. And apart from injury breaks, they have not really got long breaks. So give them a complete break from red-ball cricket. The certainties who would be playing the 50-over World Cup. You have given (Mohammed) Shami a break so maybe the others too,” he added.