‘I believe it’s better if it doesn’t happen in our culture’ – Irfan Pathan on India playing different captains in tour against South Africa
Irfan Pathan (Source: Twitter)
India’s former cricketer Irfan Pathan recently Expressed his disappointment towards the Indian cricket board appointing different captains for all the formats of the game in the Tour against South Africa from 10 December to 7 January 2024. Previously India had an all-format captain, but now since Rohit Sharma needs a break from Whiteball Cricket there have been three captains for all three formats.
India has appointed Rohit Sharma as the red ball captain, while KL Rahul and Suryakumar Yadav as ODI and T20 captains respectively. Pathan believes this is not suitable for the culture of the Indian cricket team since it will lead to the appointment of different coaches and captains which will not be efficient for all format players.
India’s Schedule for South Africa
1st T20I – December 10
2nd T20I – December 12
3rd T20I – December 14
1st ODI – December 17
2nd ODI – December 19
3rd ODI – December 21
1st Test – December 26-30
2nd Test – January 3-7
Irfan Pathan on India playing different captains in white ball cricket
During the Game Plan show on Star Sports, Irfan Pathan said, “This could be a sign for the future, which I am not a big fan of. There has been talk for a long time about whether we can do split captaincy. It’s true workload management has been done here, and that is why you are seeing such big squads and different captains.”
“It’s clear that Rohit Sharma had to take a break from white-ball cricket, so you are not seeing him there. You are seeing him as the captain of Test cricket. However, you might see these things going forward. You might even see different coaches for different formats. I believe it’s better if it doesn’t happen in our culture,” he added.
Pathan further discussed, “If we see white-ball and red-ball cricket, we only have two or three players who are different, where you can consider players like Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane. However, if you see other than that, we generally have all-format players. If we talk about our youngsters, you will see Shreyas Iyer and Shubman Gill playing everywhere. So most of our players are like that, who play all formats. That’s why if you have 70 to 80% players who play all formats, it’s better if the coach and captain are also the same.”
India’s squads for the tour
India ODI Squad: Ruturaj Gaikwad, Sai Sudharsan, Tilak Varma, Rajat Patidar, Rinku Singh, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (C)(wk), Sanju Samson (wk), Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Mukesh Kumar, Avesh Khan, Arshdeep Singh, Deepak Chahar.
India T20I Squad: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Tilak Varma, Suryakumar Yadav (C), Rinku Singh, Shreyas Iyer, Ishan Kishan (wk), Jitesh Sharma (wk), Ravindra Jadeja (VC), Washington Sundar, Ravi Bishnoi, Kuldeep Yadav, Arshdeep Singh, Mohd. Siraj, Mukesh Kumar, Deepak Chahar.
India Test Squad: Rohit Sharma (C), Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ishan Kishan (wk), KL Rahul (wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Mohd. Siraj, Mukesh Kumar, Mohd. Shami*, Jasprit Bumrah (VC), Prasidh Krishna.
