When India captain Rohit Sharma was asked about planning for the next two-year World Test Championship cycle after the 209-run loss to Australia in the 2023 WTC final at The Oval, he admitted that time has arrived to blood in new players who can serve the team for long.
In the recently-concluded WTC cycle, India had chances to ring in transition, but that didn’t happen, with the top five batters being the same in 2021 and 2023 one-off finals.
Now, with their next WTC cycle starting with two Tests in West Indies from July 12, Devang Gandhi, the former India opener, and national selector, feels time is ripe to try Yashasvi Jaiswal and Abhimanyu Easwaran in the Test team.
In the 2022-23 Ranji Trophy, Jaiswal scored 315 runs in five matches, averaging 45, including a fifty and a century. He went on to make 213 and 144 in the Irani Trophy for the Rest of India against Madhya Pradesh, with his aggregate of 357 runs in the match the most-ever for a batter in an Irani Trophy match. He was recently a stand-by player for India in the 2023 WTC Final.
Easwaran, on the other hand, had been knocking on the selection of Indian Test side for some time on the back of stellar performances in domestic circuit for Bengal and being a regular with India A team.
He was one of five standby players in the 2021 home and away series against England, apart from the 2021 WTC Final. Easwaran was also Rohit’s replacement for the Test series in Bangladesh last year, after scoring two centuries for India A against Bangladesh A.
“Two guys who come straightaway in my mind are Yashasvi Jaiswal and Abhimanyu Easwaran, purely on the weightage of runs scored by these guys. What I feel is, at this point of time, Yashasvi and Abhimanyu have done exceedingly well in domestic cricket.
Easwaran was a part of the Indian team, but for some reason, he hasn’t featured in the playing eleven. That to me was a little surprising as he did well on A tours and was a member of the side on tour to England (in 2021), but came back without being tried.
But I am sure he’s a good player and selectors will give him a fair run in the future. Plus, Abhimanyu has played in various conditions and toured the West Indies, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, so he has that experience behind him,” Gandhi told IANS.
Gandhi also feels the long-pending transition of the Test team must be initiated now.
“The first question they need to ask the selectors, team management is that in two years hence, if India reaches (the final), who are the possible guys who will feature in these Test matches,” he said.
“I definitely think time has come (for the transition to happen) and once they have that kind of discussion, they will figure it out for themselves. Also, slowly, they can get into a phase where they can phase out certain players and blood in youngsters. There has to be a good blend of experience with youth. Ideally, it should not be a knee-jerk reaction, where you discard all the seniors,” he added.
Moreover, with the absence of consistency in organising India A tour programs, something which gave the Test team many options in terms of batters and fast bowlers from 2018 onwards, it has denied the current selection committee a chance to prepare a strong line of future cricketers ready to transition to the Test team.
“When I was the selector, we had these A tours and the youngsters who did well in the domestic circuit were groomed and Rahul (Dravid) was the India A coach then. So, there were constant tours happening which helped these boys in a smooth transition to international cricket.
“They got the exposure of playing in foreign conditions, which was of big help. What I am trying to say is, from that particular phase, the likes of Rishabh Pant, Hanuma Vihari, Mohammed Siraj, Axar Patel emerged from that group,” added Gandhi.
Gandhi further expressed that organising more India A tours will benefit in identifying the future cricketers and help them in making a smooth transition to the Test team.
“That will come in very handy, to be honest. I can give an example where on one of the tours of England, they played against Alastair Cook and Chris Woakes (at Worcester in 2018),” he said.
“So, that was a fantastic experience for the batters as well as bowlers to bowl to a player of Cook’s calibre. Experiences like that help in grooming the youngsters and also helps in smooth transition from A cricket to the Test level,” he added.
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