India’s team for the forthcoming West Indies tour has generated a lot of controversy. Sarfaraz Khan’s exclusion has angered fans and analysts alike, and the omission of Cheteshwar Pujara hasn’t been warmly received either.
Meanwhile, Ajinkya Rahane has been reinstated as the Test team’s vice-captain, at least for the forthcoming trip. Notably, Rahane disappeared for approximately a year and a half before returning for the WTC Final 2023.
However, a Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) source claimed that Pujara might yet make a comeback despite being dropped.
Anyone can make a return if Ajinkya Rahane, who had been sidelined for 15 months before to the WTC final, can be named vice-captain of the Test squad. No senior player’s options are shut off. You just need to begin shifting in some place. The selectors don’t want a scenario in which all seniors leave the scene at once and there is no longer any experienced player in the changing room, a BCCI insider told the Times of India.
Pujara has scored 7,195 runs in 103 games for India while wearing the whites. His average for those runs was 43.60, and he also hit 19 hundreds and 35 fifty-sixes. Pujara has been the victim of other batters’ mistakes, according to Sunil Gavaskar, one of the former cricket players with whom the decision to dismiss Pujara did not sit well.
“He was dropped, why? Why is he being held responsible for our poor batting performance? He has consistently supported Indian cricket. a devoted and discreet servant. a devoted and successful achiever. However, you drop him because he lacks the millions of platform users who would protest if he were to be dropped. That is something I cannot comprehend. What are the requirements for retaining the others who failed and dropping him? Because the head of the selection committee no longer interacts with the media, I am unsure, Gavaskar remarked.
