Ravi Shastri wants India to get rid of Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli from T20Is

Ravi Shastri added that the criteria for T20I selection should be current form.

Former India head coach Ravi Shastri has advocated that the national team selectors should move on from Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, atleast in the T20I format, and give chances to deserving youngsters with one year to go for the 2024 T20 World Cup to be played in the West Indies and the USA.

Shastri believes the Rahul Dravid-coached side should unveil some fresh faces in their forthcoming T20I assignments.

Yashasvi Jaiswal, Jitesh Sharma, and Tilak Varma, among other talented young players, should play in India's first T20I series following the completion of the Indian Premier League (IPL 2023) according to Shastri, who put emphasis on the young players' potential.

Shastri stated that Rohit and Kohli are among the best players in cricket history when talking about their prospects in the shortest format.  

"Players like Rohit, Virat Kohli, they are proven, you know what they are all about. I would go in that [good performers in the IPL] direction so that they get the opportunities, they get the exposure, whilst you keep the Virats and the Rohits fresh for one-day cricket and Test cricket.

Your focus there with that kind of experience should move to Test cricket, red-ball cricket for the future World Test Championship, and they stay fresh [so that] there is not too much of cricket where there is overkill,” Shastri said on ESPNCricinfo’s Runorder show.

"First T20 series that comes up, play these guys [the youngsters], expose these guys. They [the selectors] should start blooding them right now,”, he said when asked about how soon players like Yashasvi Jaiswal, Jitesh Sharma, and Tilak Varma should get a promotion.

It should be the right man for the right job: Ravi Shastri on India’s T20I combination

Additionally, Shastri advocated for specialists to play each position in the batting order, against forcing players into unnatural positions, and for a reasonable ratio of left- and right-handed batters.

"It should be the right man for the right job. It shouldn't be a guy who bats at three or four for his franchise, and suddenly you make him bat at six or open the innings when it comes to picking a team for India.

I would like the mix of left-hand-right-hand batting combination. Just like you look for a left-armer with the ball, I would like to see left-handers there. You see this IPL, teams that have done well, look at the mix that they have,” he said.

With the 2024 T20 World Cup still more than a year away, the criteria for selection should solely be "current form", Shastri argued.