Highlights:
- Virat Kohli and Jasprit Bumrah have been rested for the T20I series against West Indies starting 29th July.
- Coach Rahul Dravid and skipper Rohit Sharma have come out in support of Virat saying that it is inevitable for a player to remain in and out of form.
- Kuldeep Yadav has recovered from his injury and will be back in the fold for the upcoming T20I.
For the forthcoming T20I series against the West Indies, Virat Kohli and Jasprit Bumrah have been rested. Kuldeep Yadav will rejoin the Indian team after missing time with a finger injury. However, it has been confirmed that the Chetan Sharma-led selection committee would continue to support Kohli and that he will be an essential part of the team’s strategy for the T20 world cup that will take place in November.
India is presently leading the ODI series against England, 1-0. Due to a groyne issue, Kohli missed the first ODI and is probably going to miss the second one as well.
Concern over Kohli’s performance has long been the subject of much hand-wringing. In the previous two years, he has failed to reach 100. Veteran players with illustrious careers like Kapil Dev have questioned his position on the team. In any case, Kapil had foreseen Kohli’s deterioration as a batsman in 2020, speculating that his eyesight might be a contributing factor in the slowing down of his reflexes and recommending that Kohli engages in specific workouts to enhance reflex and hand-eye coordination.
The selectors want to take precautions with the ailment in case it worsens and becomes a more serious issue. If a player rushes into the action, a groin strain can quickly turn into a proper tear. If a player enters the field before being fully fit, a rapid single or a quick turnaround during a double may unintentionally aggravate his condition.
Coach Rahul Dravid and skipper Rohit Sharma have come out in support of Virat. They say that it is inevitable for a player to remain in and out of form but that does not indicate that the player’s quality is poor.
For an extended period of time across formats, Kohli has resembled a pale shadow of his former dominant self; his most recent century was in November 2019. But what is in doubt is not his long-term prospects but rather his T20 batting model. India’s batting strategy has become more aggressive, and every hitter is expected to start playing right immediately. The manner Kohli has batted hasn’t been like that. He struggled in the IPL and has only sometimes participated in T20Is (4 of the 19 matches) since the previous season.
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Kuldeep Yadav, in the meantime, has recovered from his injury and finished his rehabilitation at Bengaluru’s National Cricket Academy. During India’s home T20I series against South Africa, he damaged his finger while practising batting in the nets.
Bumrah has received rest from the selection committee as well, keeping workload management in mind. The Indian squad still has a few more series to play before the T20 World Cup, so the selectors decided it would be best to give Bumrah a vacation as he has been playing nonstop cricket.s
Starting on July 29, the five-game T20I series against the West Indies will last until August 7. The first game will be held at Trinidad’s Brian Lara Stadium, and the following two games will each be held at St. Kitts’ Warner Park.
The final two games of the series will be played in Florida’s Central Broward Regional Park Stadium Turf Ground.
Shikhar Dhawan will captain India’s 16-man team during the three-match ODI series against the West Indies, with Ravindra Jadeja serving as his deputy. Three One-Day Internationals (ODIs) between India and Trinidad will start on July 22.
Rest has been granted to Indian legends like Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Bumrah, Rishabh Pant, Shami, and Hardik Pandya. In the months leading up to the October 2022 T20 World Cup, the team management has already declared that one of its goals is to take a close look at the bench strength.