Former India cricketer Aakash Chopra came down heavily on the Indian team management after they left out left-handed batter Sai Sudharsan from the playing XI for the first Test against South Africa that got underway in Kolkata on November 14, 2025.
In his five Test matches to date, Sudharsan has averaged just over 30, so he hasn't exactly lit the stage on fire. But nobody anticipated that the hosts would try out Washington Sundar for the crucial role instead of Sudharsan.
In the Kolkata Test, India has fielded four spinners—Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Sundar, and Ravindra Jadeja—with three of them being capable batters as well.
Despite playing a knock of 87 in India's most recent Test match against the West Indies, Sudharsan was removed from the team due to the obsession with having more all-rounders and batting depth.
Aakash Chopra stated that if the management didn't want Sudharsan in the lineup, then he should not have been there in the squad as well.
"If you’re not convinced with Sai Sudharsan’s batting after what he did in Delhi, then why is he still in the squad? Why keep him on the team? It can’t be that just because you need fifteen players, you include him even though you have no belief in him. That’s not how it works. So, they're thinking I don’t understand it," said Chopra on Star Sports Hindi.
He also urged the Gautam Gambhir-led Indian team management to stop rotating players at the important no. 3 spot in the Indian Test XI.
“Sai Sudharsan, yes, he scored runs and still got dropped. It’s true—if you’re not in the playing XI, that doesn’t mean you suddenly become a useless player. India has a chance here to prepare their players. The No. 3 spot cannot become a game of musical chairs.
Rahul Dravid, Cheteshwar Pujara—if you don’t identify the right guy now, then what? There was Karun Nair; maybe next time you’ll see Abhimanyu Easwaran—and then Sai doesn’t get prepared at all,” he added.
Additionally, Chopra believes that Sudharsan won't be overlooked in the first match of the series between South Africa and India because the hosts are using a lot of all-rounders, so someone will come up.
“Let me play devil’s advocate—there were three spinners, two fast bowlers, and West Indies didn’t get bowled out by us the second time. And it was a flat pitch; maybe they felt they wouldn’t bowl them out, so they wanted one more bowler.
I don’t think the decision had anything to do with batting. If Washington plays, or if Axar plays, they will score so many runs that you won’t miss Sai Sudharsan’s batting contribution. That happens. When the team is winning, that becomes one part of cricket—but the second part is preparing players and taking them forward,” Chopra signed off.
South Africa won the toss and chose to bat first, with Jasprit Bumrah removing both the openers after a 57-run stand. Kuldeep Yadav then accounted for two wickets in the middle order before Bumrah came back and dismissed a well-set Tony de Zorzi, leaving South Africa 125/5 at the time of writing this piece.
