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Venkatapathy Raju, a former left-arm orthodox player from India, recently addressed the hotly contested issue of Yuzvendra Chahal’s removal from both white-ball squads for India’s impending trip of Sri Lanka.
While Chahal was unquestionably a great bowler—taking the lead in T20Is for India with 96 wickets in 79 innings—Raju agreed that all-rounders are now getting more attention. As a result, players who aren’t specialists, including Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel, were chosen over Chahal. Raju observed that it was very difficult for any specialist bowler to get a spot in the playing XI with these aforementioned southpaws firmly established in the team.
“You ought to have self-confidence at all times. Chahal is a fantastic bowler. Sadly, though, we focus more on all-arounders. That’s the reason we got Jadeja, Axar Patel, and Kuldeep Yadav after that. You can’t keep Axar Patel and Ravindra Jadeja away from the eleven if they’re on the team,” declared Raju, as cited by The Times of India.
Raju added that even though Chahal is clearly skilled in his field, he was left off the roster mostly because of limited playing time. He underlined that worries about getting older or performing worse weren’t relevant because Chahal can still perform well in important games and take the pitch again. But Raju noted that the selectors now have a difficult choice because there are so many great athletes available.
“Yuzi is an excellent bowler, but he hasn’t played in enough games to have an impact. Nothing compares to growing older or being apart from something. You can consistently play well, return, and deliver. The fact that there is so much diversity these days is the biggest issue for all selections, Raju said.
I hope he plays a lot of cricket domestically and returns fit: Raju regarding Chahal
Raju acknowledged that Chahal was a game-winner, but he also brought up the matter of inadequate match practise. Raju also expressed the hope that the clever spinner will play in domestic cricket and come back stronger.
“Selecting someone in that range requires a lot of guts, and Chahal has won matches in the past; the only issue is a slight lack of match experience. Raju continued, “Hopefully, he plays a lot of domestic cricket and returns strong.
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Notably, Chahal was one of the four spinners that went to the Americas for the Twenty20 World Cup in June, and he was unable to play for India in any of the competition’s games. In addition, his last home game for his state of Haryana was in December of 2023.
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