Former Indian captain and chief selector Dilip Vengsarkar has welcomed BCCI’s "good move" to split the captaincy duties between Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma.
His comments came after the BCCI announced Rohit as the new ODI and T20I captain of Team India on Wednesday (December 8). Kohli will now only be leading India in Test cricket with Rohit as his deputy.
The former cricketer believes that the latest changes will release Kohli's pressure and allow him to focus on his batting while praising Rohit’s leadership qualities so far for both India and Mumbai Indians (MI) in the Indian Premier League (IPL). He won five IPL titles for MI.
Vengsarkar wrote in his column for Indian Express: “The BCCI has made the right move in making Rohit Sharma the India white-ball captain across ODIs and T20Is. Rohit has been doing well for quite some time now and he was waiting to get his captaincy turn. I feel it is a good move.”
He added, “Now, Kohli can concentrate on Test cricket and Rohit can concentrate on white-ball cricket, in which he has done exceptionally well as a leader so far. He has won many titles for Mumbai Indians in the IPL and has also done well in whatever games he has been given as captain of the Indian team.
Virat has had a good run as captain of the Indian white-ball team and now the burden from his shoulders will be released 100 percent. He is one of the best batsmen in the world at the moment. He is successful and there have also been some great performances under him. This will help him to concentrate more on Test cricket, which I feel is the ultimate form of cricket.”
However, Vengsarkar has suggested that the BCCI must start grooming youngsters for leadership positions so that the board can find suitable replacements for Kohli and Rohit as future captains of the Indian cricket team.
Vengsarkar recalled his stint when they made Anil Kumble captain and groomed MS Dhoni, and said that the national selectors’ job is now to groom someone who will take over the captaincy in the future and develop back-up players, saying “they just can’t throw players into the deep sea and expect them to swim”.
Vengsarkar further wrote, “The most important thing now is that the national selection committee has to groom someone who will take over the captaincy in the future. This is applicable not only to the captaincy but to players as well. Developing backup players is key because they keep everyone playing in the team on their toes.
The selectors’ job is to groom players and to create sufficient options and bench strength so that whenever great players retire, there should be no void in the team. The situation starts getting out of hand once there is a void. Look at the West Indies. They ruled world cricket for 15 years and then went from No. 1 to the bottom-ranked team at one stage [they are No. 8 currently].”
He concluded, “In my tenure as the selection committee chairman, we made Anil Kumble the captain and at the same time, we groomed MS Dhoni and others. I also groomed Ishant Sharma and took him to England, knowing that he won’t play there. But I knew he could prove to be more than handy in Australia later.”
(Indian Express inputs)
