‘What’s the Point if Rohit and Kohli Aren’t Playing?’: Former Selector Cannot Fathom Why India Benched the Batting Stars – News18

The Indian team is using the three-match ODI series against West Indies as a platform to give more game time their white-ball specialists with less than a month remaining for the Asia Cup and just over a two months’ time left before the World Cup.

With not many ODIs left before the two big events, it’s prudent to give players who haven’t played much cricket in the past few months. However, the other aspect of this ploy requires benching or demoting the seniors who play all or at least two formats.

The second ODI saw captain Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli watching from the dressing room as their teammates succumbed to a five-wicket defeat to West Indies leaving the series level at one-all.

Both were rested for the match with India continuing their experiment that saw a major shuffle in the batting order during the series opener.

India head coach Rahul Dravid has pointed out that there’s not much time left to give match time to try out players and hence the surprising selection calls.

However, former India wicketkeeper and selector Saba Karim says that benching regular players means they would be deprived of game time before the world cup.

“The regular players also need time to face these challenges,” Karim said on JioCinema. “At no. 4, you are hoping that Shreyas Iyer will come, but he will also need time to get going. Who is your back-up there? Is it Suryakumar Yadav, Ishan Kishan or Sanju Samson? Because if they are, you have to design the batting order that way. Batting first was a challenge for us and it was good that we had the chance today, but it would’ve been ideal if we had the right batting order.”

He said if the plan was to give other players more playing time, then there’s no logic behind picking up seniors like Rohit and Kohli for the ongoing ODI series.

“Also, why are Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli not playing? What’s the point of taking them with the side if they’re not playing? Why not take fresh faces then? Ideally, they should be playing because World Cup is near, you don’t have much time left,” Karim said.