Shubman Gill Called '3rd Best Option' For Captaincy. Virender Sehwag Says "How Many Matches..."

Shubman Gill was appointed Indian cricket team captain for the upcoming Test series against England with Rishabh Pant serving as his deputy. With Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma announcing their retirement, it will be a huge task for Gill to lead the side in such a crucial series. According to media reports, although Jasprit Bumrah was a major option, the selectors decided to go with Gill over him and the likes of KL Rahul and Pant. Former India batter Manoj Tiwary believes that Gill was the second choice for the selectors and the decision was mainly taken due to the uncertainty around Bumrah's fitness.

“He was the second-best option. But how can someone who doesn't even fit in the Playing XI be made captain? So I feel the logic here was that they looked at who the second-best option was, and that was Gill, and that is how it happened,” he said on Cricbuzz.

Legendary India batter Virender Sehwag agreed with Tiwary but said that for him, Rishabh Pant was the second choice for captaincy if not Bumrah.

India legend Virender Sehwag, who was also on the panel, agreed with the selectors that Bumrah should not be given the responsibility amid uncertainty over his availability for all Test matches for India. However, he disagreed with Tiwary, saying it Rishabh Pant was the second-best option and not Gill.

“For a series, Bumrah is okay. But as a long-term option, you need to ask if India play 10 Tests in a year, will he be able to play all those matches? Or, how many matches can he play? That is a major factor in picking a captain. So that I feel was the right decision, because they felt they could not put that pressure and load on Bumrah. Tiwary said Gill is the second-best, but I feel that is Rishabh Pant, and Gill is the third-best,” he said.

“What Pant did for Test cricket, no other player has done. After Virat Kohli, if there is one player who has compelled fans into watching Test cricket, it's Pant. But because he had that accident, got injured and then came back, he did not have that much of an impact, and hence he was made the vice-captain, thinking that if he can bounce back to form, they can take that decision of making him the captain in the future. But there are very few bowlers who are made the captain. In my career, it was just Anil Kumble, who loved the format, was available and was a certainty in the XI.”

Topics mentioned in this article

Shubman Gill Rishabh Pant Jasprit Bumrah Virender Sehwag Manoj Tiwary India Cricket Team England Cricket Team England vs India, 2025 Cricket