Ravichandran Ashwin advocated for Yashasvi Jaiswal’s return to India’s T20I squad. The youngster was an integral part of the set-up and was also in the T20 World Cup 2024 squad but in the presence of Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli, the 23-year-old failed to make the cut. After the tournament, he played a few games against Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka but hasn’t featured in the series against Bangladesh and South Africa and is also missing the action against England.
He was previously rested from those series for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy but is still absent from the T20I team. Former India international Ashwin meanwhile believes that Jaiswal will soon be back in the squad and also noted that in case Shubman Gill and Ruturaj Gaikwad end up scoring well in the upcoming edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL), the selectors will have a dilemma in picking the right players.“Yashasvi Jaiswal should also come back in T20Is. He was in the World Cup squad and he has to be the preferred opener. I mean, I don't want to be the chairman of selectors or team manager or be in this decision-making position. In the upcoming IPL season, if both Gill and Ruturaj score runs, it's going to be a problem of plenty (for the selectors). As fans of the Indian cricket team, we are blessed to have a pool of such talented players,” Ashwin said on his YouTube channel.
The veteran also mentioned that the players who can perform under pressure should be given the preference in selection. He stated that there aren’t any parameters in team selection at the moment but he believes that the weightage should be given to players who can be consistent under the limelight.
“We must ensure that whatever the performances are, we will have to focus on pressure parameters for big tournament. We will have to give some weightage to players who do well under pressure,” he added