Former India player turned commentator Aakash Chopra has said that Shubman Gill’s pre-planned return from the 2024 T20 World Cup has wrongly been made controversial as well. However, he was among the four reserves who travelled with India’s squad to the USA for the mega event as well.

In a video shared on his YouTube channel, Chopra said, “A non-controversy that has been made a controversy. I got hold of a poster where it was first written – ‘Shubman Gill unfollowed captain Rohit Sharma’. This is the first. Below that, it was written – ‘Removed from the squad. Shubman Gill has been released and sent back to India by BCCI’. After that – ‘Disciplinary issues, he was not traveling with the team and was spending time away from the team’. I saw this poster on Instagram. After that, Shubman Gill posted a story – ‘Sammy and I are learning the art of discipline from Rohit Sharma’. Sammy – I am sure he is talking about Samaira, who is Rohit’s daughter.”

ALSO READ: Kirti Azad welcomes BCCI’s new directive in central contract

He also added that Gill himself has posted a story that dispels all rumours. However, Virat Kohli opened with Rohit Sharma in India’s group games of the ongoing T20 World Cup. Moreover, India have Yashasvi Jaiswal as a reserve opener in the squad as well.

“Vikram Rathour also came out and said that it was their plan from earlier, that they had to trim down the squad once they reached the West Indies, and two of the travelers had to be sent back. So it was planned earlier and was just executed here. So where is it coming from? These days people have become experts in making a mountain out of a molehill. When the team is far away from home, there is a time difference and you are unable to verify or authenticate the information many times. So you play it from whatever source it comes, and this has been that kind of a World Cup, which hasn’t had stories. There are more stories of washouts than play. So keep putting oil on fire and keep making click-baits,” Aakash Chopra concluded.