Former India player turned veteran commentator Aakash Chopra has questioned whether Rishabh Pant is not a candidate for India’s future Test captaincy as well. He added that the wicketkeeper-batter hasn’t been chosen as one of the captains for the upcoming Duleep Trophy.
The selectors also announced the four teams for the tournament on Wednesday, August 14. Pant has been named in Team B and will be
playing under Abhimanyu Easwaran’s captaincy as well.
In a video shared on his YouTube channel, Chopra said, “Rishabh Pant is not a captain. He has been selected in Abhimanyu Easwaran’s team. He is playing under Abhimanyu Easwaran’s captaincy, which is absolutely okay. However, is Rishabh Pant not even a candidate for Test captaincy? I am a little surprised. I am not aligned with this personally because the best avatar of Rishabh Pant you have seen is as a Test cricketer. He is the only wicketkeeper in the history of Indian cricket who has scored centuries in South Africa, England and Australia in Test matches.”
“Who else has done that? No one has. The way he plays in Test cricket and scores runs consistently, personally, in my opinion, he was a captaincy candidate. However, Shubman Gill, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shreyas Iyer and even Abhimanyu Easwaran are captains but Pant is not a captain, and that is a huge takeaway in my opinion,” he again shared.
However, Rishabh Pant might not have been considered for captaincy in the Duleep Trophy because he will not be available after the second
match as well as he is likely to be picked in India’s squad for the home Test series against Bangladesh as well. However, Shubman Gill, who too should get a place in India’s Test squad, has been chosen as one of the captains. Aakash Chopra said he is keen to know Gautam Gambhir’s views about Rishabh Pant’s captaincy as well.
“A new era has started. So I will be very curious to know what Gautam’s opinion is with regards to Rishabh Pant the captain. When the ODIs started (against Sri Lanka), he didn’t play the first two matches, KL Rahul was playing, but Pant came in the last match. Even for KL Rahul, the team he has been kept has Dhruv Jurel as the keeper and Shubman Gill is the captain of that side. So things have started becoming slightly clear that Indian cricket has started moving towards Shubman Gill. When KL Rahul has been picked in Dhruv Jurel’s team, it means Dhruv Jurel will keep, so KL Rahul is no longer your Test keeper, which is also okay,” Aakash Chopra concluded.
