"Rohit Sharma might not play the ICC Cricket World Cup 2027" - Sunil Gavaskar fears after BCCI makes Shubman Gill new India ODI captain

Rohit Sharma last played for India in March in ICC Champions Trophy.

Former India cricketer Sunil Gavaskar has said that he fears that legendary ex-India captain Rohit Sharma might not play in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2027 after he was replaced as ODI captain by Shubman Gill.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) chief selector Ajit Agarkar revealed this huge change while announcing the Indian squads for the ODI and T20I series in Australia. Rohit Sharma had led the Indian team in the last ODI tournament played in the ICC Champions Trophy 2025 tournament, which the Men in Blue won.

Rohit Sharma is one of the most successful Indian captains, leading the team into the finals of all four ICC events in the ICC World Test Championship (WTC), ICC Cricket World Cup 2023, ICC Champions Trophy 2025, and ICC T20 World Cup 2024. He managed to win the T20 World Cup in 2024 and the Champions Trophy in 2025, while losing to Australia in the WTC final and the ODI World Cup final, both in 2023.

Sunil Gavaskar shows skepticism about Rohit Sharma playing in the ICC World Cup 2027

However, with an eye on the ICC Cricket World Cup in 2027, the selectors opted to give over the leadership reins to Shubman Gill, causing a schism in the cricket world, with some hailing it as the start of a new era and others calling it an unjust conclusion to a brilliant chapter.

Sunil Gavaskar, a former Indian cricketer, was optimistic about the leadership shift, saying that if Rohit Sharma was not likely to play in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2027, the selectors should develop a new captain for the event.

“We don’t know whether Rohit Sharma will be ready for the 2027 World Cup. He only plays ODIs now, and if we see the international calendar, the Indian team isn’t playing too many ODIs. Bilateral tours mostly include tests and T20Is. If he only plays 5-7 ODIs in a year, he won’t get that kind of practice, which you need for a big tournament like a World Cup. If his place in the team isn’t certain, the decision to prepare Shubman Gill was taken,” Gavaskar told Sports Tak.

“Team comes from. Personally, he has done a lot—won us the Champions Trophy and the T20 World Cup before that. There’s no two ways about his captaincy. But even he (Rohit Sharma) agrees with this decision because if you need to think two years ahead, then a young captain needs to be prepared. And this is the thought process the selection committee went ahead with,” he added.

Rohit Sharma has played 273 ODIs, scoring 11168 runs at an average of 48.76, scoring 32 centuries and 58 fifties with a strike rate of 92.80. His highest score is 264, and he is the only batter to hit three double-tons in ODIs.

Sunil Gavaskar Fears More Bad News

Gavaskar stated that it would be difficult for Rohit and Virat Kohli, who returned to the team for the Australia ODI series, to stay fit and in form for a major competition such as the World Cup, and that they would have to play domestic tournaments.

He discussed the veterans’ ambiguous stance on playing in the World Cup and advised fans to expect more bad news.

“Of course. If you are non-committal, if you can’t say whether you’ll be ready for the next two years, be ready [for more bad news]. Even if they are aware that if they only have to play ODI, there are rarely any. For that, they need to practice more and play something like the Vijay Hazare Trophy. This is possibly why they have taken that stance,” Gavaskar stated.

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