Sunil Gavaskar Slams India for Mistreating R Ashwin: Despite Ravi Ashwin’s evident leadership ability, the Indian team management has been criticized by former cricketer Sunil Gavaskar for not even giving him the honor of vice-captaincy.
He said that rather than only giving him the opportunity to lead the team out to bat in his 100th Test. Team India might have awarded him the armband in a bilateral series or a symbolic Test.
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After playing in 106 Test matches, 116 One-Day Internationals, and 65 Twenty20 Internationals for India, Ashwin announced his retirement last week on the penultimate day of the Gabba Test in the 2024–25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
Only Anil Kumble has taken more Test wickets for the nation than he has, with 537. Despite being regarded as one of the nation’s most brilliant cricket minds. He never held a captaincy position and only captained the IPL and local cricket during his international career.
“Ashwin would have made a fine captain for India, but he was denied even the honor of being the vice-captain. There was an opportunity to give him the belated honor even if it was for a token Test match and a limited-overs bilateral series. But that also was denied to him. That’s why it was so good to see Rohit Sharma ask him to lead the team out on his 100th Test match,” Gavaskar wrote in his column for Mid-Day.
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Gavaskar criticized the Indian team management for not making greater use of Ashwin during international Test matches, claiming that they dropped him using every “excuse of team balance.”
“Cricket being a batters’ game, the fact that he invariably won the Player of the Series award didn’t win him kudos among the batters’ fraternity. Every time there was even a five percent excuse to leave him out of the eleven, it was grabbed avidly with the excuse of team balance.”
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“At home, there was no way he could be left out because the management knew that without him, they could not win the game. If the excuse was that the pitch and conditions wouldn’t suit the ICC number one-ranked bowler. How come the same excuse was not used for the batters even if they were not top-ranked by ICC, but who struggled in similar pitches and conditions?”
Many commentators think that Ashwin was pressured to announce his retirement by Washington Sundar’s selection over him for the series’ opening Test match in Perth.
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