Indian Test team captain Virat Kohli’s plans of playing a few first-class matches in England before the team tours there may be shortened as BCCI has raised an objection to it. Kohli was going to skip the Afghanistan Test for playing in England. The Board of Cricket in India has commented that such an incident will set a bad precedent and will tarnish India’s intentions.

Afghanistan is slated to play their debut Test against India at Bangalore on 14th June. The news had come about regarding Virat Kohli skipping the Test match in order to prepare better for the upcoming English tour. Kohli especially has a very poor batting average in England and he will eager to clear the record.

Also when India played South Africa earlier this year, the major issue was lack of preparation. Thanks to T20I against Sri Lanka, the Indian team was underprepared on the South African tour. But BCCI does not wants to underrate the Afghanistan Test match in order for Kohli to prepare better.

“If a decision has been taken to allow the India captain to miss an international game and play County cricket at that point of time, it would set a very bad precedent,” the daily quoted an unnamed BCCI official as saying. “It would give a very bad message to the visiting Afghanistan team; that maybe the opponents aren’t worthy for us. It would be disrespectful to the Afghanistan team and also, it would be unfair on the broadcaster. (Even if) he is playing in England at that time, he can come back for one Test and then fly back. And if he is so keen to play County cricket, has he sought permission to miss his IPL games?”

The clash of opinions may eventually see Virat Kohli flying back from England to play in the one-off Test against Afghanistan and reach back England to prepare for the series.