Gavaskar slams selectors on Ajinkya Rahane's omission from squad for Australia T20s

Mumbai: Former India captain-turned-commentator Sunil Gavaskar on Wednesday slammed Indian cricket team selectors over the exclusion of Ajinkya Rahane from Virat Kohli-led squad for the three-match Twenty20 series against Steve Smith’s Australia.

The MSK Prasad-led selection panel dropped Rahane from the 15-man squad despite him scoring four fifty-plus scores in the recently concluded ODI series, which India won 4-1.

Read: Here’s what Rahane said on his exclusion from India squad for Australia T20s

Rahane was the fourth highest run-getter with 244 runs while KL Rahul did not feature in a single game.

"Rahane's omission is not understandable. He just scored four consecutive fifties (in the five-match ODI series) - why is he not in the team (for Australia T20I)? Now, KL Rahul is a fine batsman. But he did not play a single game in the five one-dayers. So why is he in the (T20I) team and not Rahane who scored four half-centuries. Some reason has to be given by the selection committee to say that Rahul is such a better player than Rahane in the one-day game, in the T20 format. Therefore, we have picked him," Gavaskar, who was utterly displeased with Rahane’s omission from the squad, told NDTV.

“For a man who does not find a place in the last five or six one-day games for India still manages a place in the T20 (format) when the man who has played all the six ODIs after the fourth ODI against Sri Lanka and scored four half-centuries. So, please explain to me how he (Rahane) finds himself out of the T20 side," added Gavaskar.

India squad for Australia Twenty20s:

Virat Kohli (Captain), Rohit Sharma (vice-captain), Shikhar Dhawan, Lokesh Rahul, Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav, Dinesh Karthik, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Hardik Pandya, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Ashish Nehra, Axar Patel.