Dhoni will not be a part of World T20: Sunil Gavaskar

Sunil Gavaskar believes that Dhoni's exclusion from the team is timely as India needs a young wicket-keeper batsman who can play the role of a finisher

After a lot of speculations and hue and cry following the selectors decision to not pick Dhoni for India's T20I squad scheduled to play against West Indies and Australia, former India captain Sunil Gavaskar has said that he believes that Dhoni's exclusion from the team is timely as India needs a young wicket-keeper batsman who can play the role of a finisher. Undoubtedly, Dhoni has not been in good form with the bat recently.

When asked whether the decision to not pick MS Dhoni for T20Is was right, Gavaskar told CricTracker, “Dhoni knows that he will not be a part of the World T20 in 2020, so he’s thought about the overall good of Indian cricket and given Rishabh Pant a chance to gather more experience in T20Is. Pant has an exceptional T20 record in the IPL. So that’s why he’s made himself unavailable.”

Speaking to SportsTak, the legendary batsman added, “I also want Dhoni to continue to play whatever matches he can for Jharkhand because that’s what will give him match practice. For someone over 35, he needs to be playing international cricket constantly to keep up with the changes. So if he plays as much cricket as possible until January, Indian cricket will benefit from it.”

After the three-match T20I series against the Windies, India will tour Australia for 3 T20Is, 4 Tests and 3 ODIs. However, Dhoni isn’t likely to make a comeback to the Indian squad return before January when the ODI series will take place.