The journey of the Indian cricket team in the ICC T20 World Cup 2021 ended yesterday with a win against Namibia in its last league match of the tournament. Though India registered three successive wins in the last three matches, its overall campaign was quite disappointing and it was not even able to secure a place in the semi-finals. Fans are pretty upset as they never expected such poor performance from the Indian team which was considered as the favorites to win the trophy in the beginning of the tournament. India’s start in the ICC T20 World Cup was disastrous as it lost its first league match to Pakistan and then the second one to New Zealand.
Team India will be making a new beginning now as Virat Kohli has already announced that he will quit the T20 captaincy after the T20 World Cup whereas the tenure of head coach Ravi Shastri has also come to an end with the tournament. While Rahul Dravid has been appointed as the new head coach of the Indian team, there has been no official announcement regarding the new T20 skipper but as per reports, Rohit Sharma may be the one who will lead the Indian team from now onwards.
While speaking in a press conference, Ravi Shastri expressed his opinion on various issues. Talking about Rohit Sharma being the new skipper, he says that he feels Rohit Sharma is quite capable of leading the team considering the fact that he has won IPL multiple times and also because he has the experience of playing as vice-captain for the national side.
Rohit Sharma is the most successful skipper of the IPL as under his leadership, Mumbai Indians has won 5 titles while the tournament’s second most successful captain is MS Dhoni as CSK has won the title 4 times. On the other hand, Virat Kohli has been playing for Royal Challengers Bangalore since 2008 and has been leading it since 2013 but RCB hasn’t been able to win even a single title. Virat Kohli has also given up the captaincy of RCB as mega auction is scheduled to take place next year.
Talking about split captaincy, Ravi Shastri states that it is not a bad idea especially in the present times when players have to live in the bio-bubble due to COVID-19. He adds that players have to be rotated as they should be able to meet and spend some time with their family members. Shastri is of the opinion that if a cricketer is living in the bio-bubble for a long time, he may have his family with him on the tour but still he is not able to meet his parents and other family members.
Though India failed to win the World Cup, Ravi Shastri feels that India will always have a strong T20 team as the IPL showcases the talent of many players and increases their chances of playing for the country.
Team India has performed well under Virat Kohli and Ravi Shastri as it won many bilateral series but they both failed in making the team win an ICC trophy.