Captain switch: Rohit out, Gill in

One cannot fault the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) for taking pragmatic decisions on the future. Displacing Rohit Sharma as the ODI captain and installing Shubman Gill as the new skipper is in order.

- S.KANNAN

At the same time, the decision to appoint Shreyas Iyer as deputy to Gill is a clear plan for the future, with the ICC ODI World Cup in 2027 becoming important.

Indeed, the writing was on the wall for Rohit Sharma, who has not played any international cricket after the Champions Trophy in Dubai earlier this year. Having retired from Test cricket, the only format available for Rohit was the ODI. That the BCCI has included him and Virat Kohli for the three ODIS against Australia, in an away series, is strange. Some say, this could be a farewell of sorts, though chairman of the selection committee, Ajit Agarkar was not clear on this topic at the press conference in Mumbai on Saturday.