Sanjay Manjrekar, a former Indian cricket player and commentator, has started a discussion with his recent remarks about important Indian players, such as Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, and Jasprit Bumrah, not being included in the upcoming Duleep Trophy. In a tweet, Manjrekar noted that India has participated in 249 international games over the past five years, but Rohit played in only 59%, Kohli in 61%, and Bumrah in just 34% of those matches. He suggested that these well-rested players should have been chosen for the domestic competition to get important game time.
The Duleep Trophy is scheduled to start on September 5, 2024, in Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh, and at Bengaluru’s M Chinnaswamy Stadium. Even though some well-known players like Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, KL Rahul, and Shubman Gill will be there, the absence of Kohli, Rohit, and Bumrah has led to questions about how ready the team is for the upcoming Test series against Bangladesh.
In his article for mid-day, famous cricketer Sunil Gavaskar agreed with Manjrekar’s thoughts. He said that Kohli and Rohit, who are both around 30 years old, might improve by playing in the Duleep Trophy. This would help them keep their skills strong and their minds fresh. Gavaskar understood that Bumrah needs a break because of his past injuries, but he believed that the top batters could have used the opportunity to improve their skills with a red ball.
Team A: Shubman Gill (C), Mayank Agarwal, Riyan Parag, Dhruv Jurel, KL Rahul, Tilak Varma, Shivam Dube, Tanush Kotian, Kuldeep Yadav, Akash Deep, Prasidh Krishna, Khaleel Ahmed, Avesh Khan, Vidwath Kaverappa, Kumar Kushagra, Shaswat Rawat.
Team B: Abhimanyu Easwaran (C), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Sarfaraz Khan, Rishabh Pant, Musheer Khan, Nitish Kumar Reddy*, Washington Sundar, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohd Siraj, Yash Dayal, Mukesh Kumar, Rahul Chahar, R Sai Kishore, Mohit Awasthi, N Jagadeesan (WK).
Team C: Ruturaj Gaikwad (C), Sai Sudharsan, Rajat Patidar, Abishek Porel (WK), Suryakumar Yadav, B Indrajith, Hrithik Shokeen, Manav Suthar, Umran Malik, Vyshak Vijaykumar, Anshul Khamboj, Himanshu Chauhan, Mayank Markande, Aryan Juyal (WK), Sandeep Warrier.
Team D: Shreyas lyer (C), Atharva Taide, Yash Dubey, Devdutt Padikkal, Ishan Kishan (WK), Ricky Bhui, Saransh Jain, Axar Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Aditya Thakare, Harshit Rana, Tushar Deshpande, Akash Sengupta, KS Bharat (WK), Saurabh Kumar.
Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma were part of the Indian team that recently lost an ODI series to Sri Lanka. This was the first time they lost under their new head coach, Gautam Gambhir.
India will play two Test matches against Bangladesh, one on September 19 in Chennai and another on September 27 in Kanpur. Whether the players participate in the Duleep Trophy is up to them, but Manjrekar’s remarks have led to a larger conversation about how important domestic cricket is for preparing players for international games.
