After a humiliating 3-0 defeat to New Zealand at home, the Rohit Sharma-led suffered a 3-1 loss to Australia in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy and was ruled out of the World Test Championship (WTC) race. The senior batters, particularly captain Rohit and Virat Kohli struggled heavily in the longest format and after which, questions were raised about their future in the format.
BCCI officials, on the other hand, were extremely unhappy with the performance of the players in Test cricket. After the defeat to Australia, they made it mandatory for each player to feature in domestic cricket more regularly and for the same reason, many India internationals took part in the ongoing round of the Ranji Trophy. However, most of them, including Rohit, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant, Shreyas Iyer and Rajat Patidar among others failed miserably.
Speaking on the same, former cricketer Aakash Chopra noted that Mumbai, despite being a team filled with stars struggled to put up a decent show with the bat against Jammu and Kashmir. He called out the players of other teams too for their poor performance but interestingly added that the Ranji form will eventually not bother them in Test cricket.
“Mumbai are struggling and how. The team has Rohit Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Ajinkya Rahane, Shreyas Iyer, Shivam Dube and Shardul Thakur. They are a powerhouse, and J&K have jolted them in both innings. Everyone went to play in the Ranji Trophy, it's only about Mumbai, Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant, and Rajat Patidar were playing, it was a long list, but whoever played, got out. It's incredible. Runs aren't being scored in the Ranji Trophy. It's become a new story,” Chopra added.
“The truth is that whether you score runs or not, it won't make a difference to your career or Test form. The second part was probably more important than the first, that your Test form has nothing to do with it, as the next Test match is after five months,” he reasoned.
Notably, Ravindra Jadeja is the only Test-playing cricketer who looked impressive on his Ranji return. He picked up 12 wickets against Delhi, including a five-wicket haul in the first innings and seven wickets in double. He also made 38 runs with the bat in the first innings.