Shubman Gill made 127* at stumps of day one of first Test in Leeds against England.
Sanjay Manjrekar has stated that he still believes it wasn't the "right decision" to select Shubman Gill over Jasprit Bumrah as the captain of the Indian men's Test team. He clarified, though, that he never believed Gill would be a "failure" because he had the disposition to be successful.
Manjrekar's remarks were made shortly after Gill scored an incredible century on his first day as captain on Friday, ending the first day of the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy against England in Headingley with a perfect record of 127 (175).
Following a strong start by another centurion, Yashasvi Jaiswal, 101, and KL Rahul, 42, Rishabh Pant joined him at 65*. India had total control of the match and headed to stumps on day 1 with 359/3.
“I was against it. Let’s be very honest, because I thought Bumrah would have been the better choice and the logical choice, without really thinking too much about the future, looking into the crystal ball. So I don’t think it was the right decision. But was Shubman Gill going to be a failure as captain? No,” Manjrekar said on JioStar as per Hindustan Times.
With a specific request to the BCCI, Bumrah recently acknowledged that he participated in the leadership talks but chose not to continue, stating that his body (still healing from a significant back injury sustained during the tour of Australia) would not permit him to play five Test matches in a row.
“As captain, temperamentally, we knew that he wouldn’t carry the anxiety of being the captain and affect his pattern. That is something we knew. The only question that we had was that he was still a kind of evolving material when it came to overseas cricket. There were some questions about whether the added pressure of captaincy could be too much for a guy who has not quite made a mark in overseas cricket,” Manjrekar added.
The former India opener was impressed with Gill’s technical compactness, which he felt went a long way in his performance.
“Today, he got rid of three important technical areas that have, you know, prevented him from getting big overseas 100. The pitch was good, the bowling was friendly, but once he got rid of those technical issues, there’s only one strength to look at when it comes to temperament and other things," Manjrekar said.
India have a very good chance of posting a huge first innings total with batting still to come in form of Karun Nair, Ravindra Jadeja and Shardul Thakur.