Former Indian cricketer Aakash Chopra has made a bombshell statement on Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli’s return to the India cricket team’s T20I squad. Just yesterday, the senior pros were named in the IND vs AFG T20I series squad after more than a year of not playing in the format for India.
With Rohit and Kohli returning, Chopra claimed that this wouldn’t have happened a year ago in 2023 due to the duo’s lackluster performance in the T20 World Cup 2022.
“I would possibly give you this in writing that he (Rohit Sharma) wouldn’t have been in the team if this series was happening 6 months after the 2022 T20 World Cup. Rohit Shame wouldn’t have been alone, and Virat Kohli wouldn’t have been there either.
The sentiment during that time was different, and neither played T20s for a year for India after that, and it wasn’t as if they were unavailable all the time either. But the selectors decided to look in the other direction.
The loss in the 2022 T20 World Cup was pinned on India’s slow batting; everyone was playing aggressively, barring Pakistan, but we were playing defensive cricket.”
On what caused the selectors to take a U-turn on their decision to play Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli, Chopra said:
“We had said we’d score 100 runs in 10 overs, but that didn’t happen. Then in the ODI World Cup 2023, we saw Rohit play T20 style of cricket in ODIs, and Virat Kohli became the player of the tournament.“
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