MOHALI: The first Twenty20 International between Afghanistan and Mohali on Friday will be without Virat Kohli. On the eve of the game, India coach Rahul Dravid announced that captain Virat Kohli will be absent due to personal reasons and would return for the series’ second and third games in Indore and Bengaluru. “Virat Kohli will miss the first game due to personal reasons,” remarked Dravid. “He will be playing from the second and third T20I.” The three-match series between India’s skipper Rohit Sharma and Kohli against Afghanistan is noteworthy since it marks their first return to Twenty20 Internationals since their loss to England in the semi-final of the Twenty20 World Cup in November 2022. During this time, both players took a break from the format to concentrate on the two lengthier formats, with India participating in the 2023 ODI World Cup and the World Test Championship final. “There’s been quite a few ICC events over the last two, three years, and a lot of them back to back,” Dravid stated. Thus, the intervals between these ICC events are not too long. Since it’s impossible for every player to play every day given the quantity of cricket played and player management, we have had to prioritize different forms and tournaments at different points during the previous two years that I’ve been here. “Thus, we’ve always needed to set priorities, particularly for the guys who play all three formats.
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The Afghanistan series is the final Twenty20 International match for India before the Twenty20 World Cup in the West Indies and the USA in June. It is also the last opportunity for players to secure a spot in the tournament outside of the upcoming Indian Premier League, which takes place from March 29 to May 26. Despite the vast experience and expertise that Rohit and Kohli possess, they may have to contend with other young batters who have recently joined the Indian team and demonstrated remarkable talent. “Clearly, we had given the one-day World Cup priority for the majority of the previous year, following the conclusion of the T20 World Cup. In terms of the T20 format, we haven’t played many games since the one-day World Cup,” Dravid remarked. From that standpoint, this T20 World Cup is a little different because there hasn’t been much time to prepare. Thus, it goes without saying that we must rely on our cricket team. And a brief mention of the IPL as well. The boys, however, are going to play T20 cricket. They will therefore be participating in the IPL here. We’ll just have to make due with the possibility that we won’t have many opportunities to play together. All you need to do is be adaptable and flexible. I felt that we had a lot of games together as a group even before the last T20 World Cup, so we had a pretty decent preparation going into the one-day World Cup. We most likely won’t have that this time, so we just need to adjust and go on.” Dravid further stated that Yashasvi Jaiswal and Rohit would open in Mohali together. India may choose to insert Shubman Gill, who typically opens the batting, at No. 3 instead of Kohli, or Sanju Samson or Tilak Varma. The injured Suryakumar Yadav and Hardik Pandya will also miss the series, meaning the entire top six will have a new appearance.
