Ever since India’s ouster from the T20 World Cup 2022 semi-final, the team has been led by two different captains in the white-ball formats. Hardik Pandya has led the Men in Blue in T20Is whereas Rohit Sharma continues to lead the side in the 50-over format.
In fact, Rohit along with Virat Kohli and KL Rahul is yet to play a T20I since India's exit from the 2022 edition of T20 World Cup.
Amid the talks of split captaincy and different set of players for Tests, ODIs and T20Is, former India opener Aakash Chopra has opined that Rohit will remain India's ODI and Test captain till this year.
“I don’t think we will see a single captain for all formats just yet, I think those days are over. Rohit Sharma will be the Test team’s captain till the WTC, that’s not going to change - it is going to stay like that," he said on Jio Cinema.
According to Chopra, Hardik will lead India in next year's T20 World Cup while he tipped Shubman Gill or Rishabh Pant to be India’s ODI captain in future.
"Hardik Pandya is currently the captain in the T20 format, and I think he will continue to do so and in the ICC T20 World Cup 2024, you will see Pandya be the captain of the Indian team. In One-Day cricket, Rohit Sharma will continue to be the captain till the World Cup. But I think in the long term, in terms of India’s captaincy, it will be Shubman Gill and Rishabh Pant. These are my two candidates for India’s captaincy in the future,” he said.
Having met with a horrific car crash last month, India’s leading wicketkeeper-batter Rishabh Pant is likely to be out of action for a considerable period.
Chopra also shared his views on the ideal replacement for Pant across formats.
“It is really unfortunate that Rishabh Pant isn’t available for us at the moment. He is the kind of player who can play in all formats and is an excellent one too. What I feel is that we will see various players across the different formats. I would say KS Bharat and Ishan Kishan, both are in contention for Test cricket. If you need a better keeper then KS Bharat but if you need an explosive left-hand batter because we don’t have a lefty in the top order, then I would say we can say, Ishan Kishan. Personally, my preference will be KS Bharat because he can keep the scoreboard ticking in Tests and we need someone who is going to be able to handle Ravichandran Ashwin and Jadeja’s bowling behind the wicket. In T20s, It’s going to be a toss-up between Ishan Kishan and Sanju Samson and ODIs will obviously feature KL Rahul behind the wicket, there is no question about it.”
