Former Indian cricketer-turned-politician Gautam Gambhir admitted that Hardik Pandya is in line to replace Rohit Sharma as Team India’s T20I captain if the BCCI makes changes to the leadership set-up in the wake of the disappointing ICC T20 World Cup 2022 campaign in Australia.
After the Indian cricket team was eliminated from the T20 World Cup 2022 after an embarrassing 10-wicket loss to the current champions England in the semi-finals, there have been numerous calls for Pandya to be named T20I captain. He recently led Team India to 1-0 T20I series win in New Zealand.
But Gambhir feels it would be unfair to remove Rohit just because of one failure in the ICC event. However, the former opener feels Pandya can take over the T20I captaincy in the future but, surprisingly, named Prithvi Shaw as another contender for the India captaincy.
Gautam Gambhir said at an event organized by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI): “Hardik Pandya obviously is in line. But that’s going to be unfortunate for Rohit because I think judging his captaincy in only one ICC event is not the right way to probably judge him.”
Well, Shaw is an unusual choice because he hasn’t played for Team India since July 2021 and is still out of contention for the national team reportedly due to his fitness issues. Notably, the right-handed batter, who had led India to the U-19 World Cup win in 2018, was suspended for a doping violation in 2019.
Explaining why he picked Shaw for captaincy, he noted: “The reason I’ve picked Prithvi Shaw, I know a lot of people talk about his off-field activities, but that is what the job of the coach and the selectors are. The selectors’ job isn’t just to pick the 15, but also to get people walk the right path.”
Gambhir signed off by saying, “Prithvi Shaw is one I feel can be a very aggressive captain, a very successful captain because you see that aggression in the way a person plays the sport.”
(With First Cricket Inputs)
