The Indian cricket team has seen a lot of chopping and changing ever since Virat Kohli took over as the full-time captain from MS Dhoni in 2017 and that's the major reason behind India's failure in the ICC tournaments.
He has been criticized by many for making a lot of changes in the Playing XI regularly despite his record is reasonably good in all three formats of the game.
Read Also: Virat Kohli unquestionably the best batsman among current lot: Ian Chappell
However, Kohli is yet to win an ICC event under his captaincy while his team couldn’t also find a regular no. 4 despite making a lot of changes over the past two years, leading to failure in the 2019 World Cup semi-final despite reaching the knockouts with ease.
During the 2019 World Cup, Kohli surprised all by picking Vijay Shankar over a number of experienced players in the tournament.
Well, former cricketer Mohammad Kaif was not also impressed with Kohli’s over-experimenting approach, slamming the captain for his lack of confidence in players, as a captain is responsible for making many careers by persistently backing young talents in the team.
Kaif said during a live session on Helo App, “Kohli is doing a lot of experiments with team selection. He should not have done that. Kohli tried many combinations and even selected players who don't have so much exposure during last world cup.”
He further added, “He should focus and back his team selection. If any player loses his form for some matches, still he should support them. Kohli should be looking to make players. Then only he can create a good team.”
On the wicket-keeper conundrum, Kaif believes that KL Rahul can be a good backup option in limited-overs cricket, but could not be a permanent solution, suggesting India to support Rishabh Pant relentlessly if he is Dhoni’s successor instead of him serving drinks for the team.
Kaif further explained, “Even for the Wicket keeping role, they are shuffling many players. India needs a permanent specialist wicket-keeper. KL Rahul can be a backup wicket-keeper but I don't think he should be the main one.”
He signed off by saying, “If you want to support Rishabh Pant over Dhoni, then Kohli should back him. He should not be the water boy of the team. Kohli and his team should overcome this hurdle. If it is so, Kohli will be the most successful captain when he retires.”
(With CricketNext Inputs)
