Former India captain and chief selector Kris Srikkanth has called the Indian team highly over-rated in Tests and T20Is, but a fantastic team in ODI cricket. This comes ahead of the second and final Test between South Africa and India to be played in Cape Town from January 3, 2024.
Srikkanth slammed the Indian team and called it an overrated side in Test cricket and argued that several cricketers playing in the Test team have underperformed in the recent past and the deserving candidates, like Kuldeep Yadav, were not getting their chances.
"In T20 cricket India is highly over-rated. ODI cricket, we are a fantastic team. What happens in ODis, in the semi-finals, finals, it's just a one-off match. It's a luck factor, a lot depends on luck in these matches. I read Rohit Sharma's statement, for a cricketer, the 50-over World Cup is a huge achievement. We are sometimes underperforming in the knockout matches, in the semi-finals and the final. But we are a gun side in ODI. Regardless of where we play, be it India, Australia or South Africa, we are a gun side," Srikkanth said on his YouTube channel.
Srikkanth also praised the performance of Indian team under Virat Kohli’s captaincy and said that since Rohit Sharma has taken over, the team has only been living on the reputation of past laurels.
"Test cricket, we are over-rated. We have to make sure... I think it was a phase of 2-3 years... when Virat Kohli was the captain of the team, we were outstanding. We dominated in England, we fought hard in South Africa, we won in Australia. We had a good phase for 2-4 years. Yes, we were dominating in England, in Australia," Srikkanth said.
The former captain also stated that India needs to forget about the ICC rankings, in which they are currently no.1 in all three formats. He argued that several Indian players are overrated and quality players are sitting outside of the Test team.
"We have to forget ICC ranking. We are always 1-2, 1-2. It's a combination of having over-rated cricketers and people who have not performed up to their potential. Or there are players who have not enough chances like Kuldeep (Yadav)," Srikkanth said.
Rohit Sharma had said that the Indian team knew how to win Test matches abroad while talking about the loss in the first Test against South Africa.
But Srikkanth reminded him that their last win came 18 months ago and there was no point calling on the same.
"If you want to be the best team, you should be capable of being the giants in their home grounds. That is what we did when Rishabh Pant was firing. But you can keep on saying that we scored in Australia, we scored in England. You can sing the same song, you won't move forward if you rest on past laurels. You have to just look at how you have performed in the last 2 years, last 18 months," concluded the 1983 World Cup winner.
(India Today inputs)
