India’s humiliating loss in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy series, which was part of their stretch of six defeats in last eight matches, opened the pandora’s box. But one the sparked the most concern and calls for an immediate attention is the future of India’s senior batters Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma. And as the dilemma continues with BCCI expected to have their first discussion on the matter come Sunday, in the Special General Meeting, board’s new secretary, Devajit Saikia have been told to send chief selector Ajit Agarkar a “strict message” on solving the big dilemma and “choosing a new team.”
Kohli and Rohit were under-fire even when they had left for Australia, which the tour billed as a make-or-break series for the two. Kohli did bounce back to score a ton in Perth, but managed just 90 more runs in the remaining innings, without a single fifty. Rohit, on the other hand, scored just 31 runs on the tour in five innings at just 6.2, before he dropped himself out of the series decider in Sydney. Overall, he managed just 164 runs in eight matches since September, averaging a tick over 10.
‘New secretary should give Agarkar a strict message’
With focus set to shift on the white-ball format with the ICC Champions Trophy coming up and India asked to submit their provisional team by January 12, Sakiya, who replaced Jay Shah as the new secretary of the BCCI, has been highlighted that the ongoing rumours on the future of Rohit and Kohli, especially with the captain having clarified that retirement is still not on his mind despite the Sydney move, is making the board look weak.
In a conversation with Dainik Jagran, a former BCCI official said that the board needs to send out a strong message as he subtly hinted at dropping both Kohli and Rohit from the Test team. He reminded that no player is bigger than the game.
“The message is going very bad. People can be sweet pawns on the internet but BCCI has to run cricket in the country and it should also be seen running it. Now there is a need to give such a strong message that no player should consider himself bigger than the game. Now there is a need to choose a new team. The selection committee headed by Ajit Agarkar is of BCCI and the new secretary should call him, and also give a strict message,” he said.
India will play their next Test match in the final half of June, in a tour of England.
