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Former India head coach Ravi Shastri has been busy giving interviews ever since his tenure as Team India's head coach ended following the Men in Blue's exit from the T20 World Cup. While Shastri's reign was full of India wins in series in all parts of the world, perhaps the only missing block from the puzzle was an ICC trophy.
And now after having hung up his coaching boots, the 59-year-old has revealed what exactly went wrong in these ICC events especially the 2019 World Cup. Notably, there were questions raised over the team selection for that tournament in England especially after captain Virat Kohli had admitted that Ambati Rayudu will be the team's number 4 in the marquee event but was later dropped from the squad.
I wasn’t okay with three wicketkeepers being picked for World Cup: Shastri
Shastri has now said that either of Rayudu or Shreyas Iyer should have been in that squad.
"I had no say in that (team selection). But I wasn’t okay with three wicketkeepers being picked for the World Cup. Either Ambati or Shreyas could’ve come in. What was the logic in having MS Dhoni, Rishabh [Pant] and Dinesh [Karthik] all together?" said Shastri in a conversation with The Times of India.
"But I never interfered with the selectors’ work, except when I was asked for feedback or as part of a general discussion," he added.
Semifinal against New Zealand in 2019 ODI World Cup was MS Dhoni's last international match
While India had looked great in the league stage of that tournament and were favourites to go all the way, they were eliminated from the event post a narrow defeat to New Zealand in the semifinals, which turned out to be MS Dhoni's last international fixture.
Post that defeat, India reached the finals of the ICC World Test Championship but lost yet again to the Kiwis. The Indian side were also knocked out of the T20 World Cup 2021 in the first round itself where a defeat to Blackcaps again proved to be decisive after a defeat to Pakistan in the opening match of the tournament.
Following the T20 World Cup, Rohit Sharma has taken over as the white-ball skipper with two World Cups (T20 and ODI) coming up in the next two years.