India’s young batter Shubman Gill has been constantly making headlines with his extraordinary run across formats. In the recently concluded Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Gill was asked to join the playing XI in place of out-of-form KL Rahul where he scored his second Test century in the Ahmedabad Test against Australia.
Veteran Indian opener Shikhar Dhawan would have picked Shubman Gill ahead of him as an opener in ODIs. While talking to Aaj Tak Dhawan said, “If I was the selector then definitely would have given the chance to Shubman. Would have selected Shubman over Shikhar.”
“I feel the way Shubman is (playing at the moment). Like he was playing two formats and performing well in Tests and T20s. He was playing more matches in the international circuit and I wasn’t.” he added.
Dhawan also talked about Ishan Kishan who made a double hundred in December last year against Bangladesh.
“When Ishan Kishan slammed a double century against Bangladesh, then for a moment I thought I could be out of the team.”
“When Rohit took over the captaincy he, along with Rahul Dravid backed me enough. They told me they wanted me to focus on my cricket and that my vision should be the next World Cup,” he said.
“2022 was very good for me, I was consistent in ODIs. But there is this young guy who has been doing well in two formats, and when my form dipped in a series or two then they gave a chance to Shubman and he has lived up to their expectations.
“This is not something new in cricket. Or this happened just with me, plenty others have met with same fate. There are times when you play well throughout the year and then your form drops for one month or two, sometimes that becomes bigger than your performance throughout the year. When a captain, coach and selector take a decision they put plenty of thoughts into it,” said Dhawan.