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‘Rohit and Dravid have already decided…': Jadeja's massive claim about India's Asia Cup and World Cup squads
India all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja echoed Dravid's words and rubbished the talks around India's combination not being settled for Asia Cup and World Cup.
The Indian team management came under fire after they decided to rest captain Rohit Sharma and star batter Virat Kohli from the second ODI against the West Indies and ended up losing that game by six wickets in Barbados. This happened after Rohit batted at No.7 - even below Shardul Thakur - and Kohli did not bat at all in India's 115-run chase in the series-opening ODI.
And it was not as if India were playing a settled batting-order in the absence of Rohit and Kohli. Suryakumar Yadav was promoted to No.3 in the first ODI, while he batted at No.6 in the next match as Sanju Samson got an opportunity to bat at No.3 and Axar Patel was sent in at No.4. With only two months to go for the World Cup, this large scale experimentation did not go down too well with the fans and experts. India head coach Rahul Dravid, however, defended the management's call and said the idea behind not playing Rohit and Kohli was to give game-time to others.
Ahead of the series-decided third and final ODI at the Brian Lara Stadium in Trinidad, all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja echoed Dravid's words and rubbished the talks around India's combination not being settled. The all-rounder in fact went to the extent of saying that India are quite sure about their best XI for the upcoming Asia Cup and World Cup.
"This is the series before the Asia Cup and World Cup, where we can experiment, we can try out new combinations. It will give us an idea about the team's balance, strengths and weaknesses," Jadeja told reporters on the eve of the series decider.
‘Captain and team management know the combination for Asia Cup’: Jadeja
India's 50-over assignments after the tour of the Caribbeans include the Asia Cup which starts later this month followed by a three-match series against Australia and the all-important ODI World Cup in October.
While Jasorit Bumrah has been included in the squad for the T20I series against Ireland after a long injury layoff, India are still without their first-XI players like KL Rahul and Shreyas Iyer, who are still undergoing rehab and are expected to be directly picked for the Asia Cup.
"Captain and team management know what combination they are going to play. There is no confusion at all. We have already decided what is going to be the combination in the Asia Cup, they have already decided that before. But it's more about trying out a particular player or batter at a batting position," Jadeja said.
India are expected to continue giving valuable game time to youngsters in the series-deciding third match on Tuesday.
Jadeja, who is expected to play a key role as a finisher and a left-arm spinner in both Asia Cup and World Cup, said the loss in the second ODI was not due to the experiments. "We were not disappointed with the loss. We didn't lose the match because of experiments, sometimes conditions also matter.
"We are trying different combinations. We can try different batters at different positions. This is the series where we can afford to chop and change. Young players also need that international experience, they also need game time," he said.
