Team India's former spinner Harbhajan Singh has expressed surprise at Rohit Sharma's removal from ODI captaincy. On October 4, BCCI announced India’s white-ball team for the upcoming eight matches in Australia. In the ODI squad, a few major changes happened and one of them was Shubman Gill replacing Rohit Sharma in the leadership role. This decision indicates that the BCCI is looking forward to the future and the board wants a young face like Gill to captain the team in the Cricket World Cup 2027, set to be played after a couple of years.
Harbhajan Singh, who played alongside Rohit in Team India and Mumbai Indians (MI), has said that he was expecting the 38-year-old should’ve been given the chance to lead the team in Australia as the veteran
guided India to the Champions Trophy 2025 triumph this year. "I thought if at all he was going to Australia, he would have been captain again. He just won the Champions Trophy and other tournaments as well, so I think he's been one of the pillars of Indian cricket when it comes to white-ball cricket. So I think he should have given that at least this tour," remarked Harbhajan in a chat with Star Sports.
Harbhajan Singh feels India had enough time to bring change in the leadership
Harbhajan Singh believes Team India management should’ve been patient with the leadership change as the World Cup 2027 is still far away. The World Cup 2011 champion said that Shubman could’ve been handed the captaincy baton a year later.
"If you want to think of 2027 World Cup that's still very far. Shubman can obviously wait a little bit and probably take the team forward after maybe in 6 or 8 months or a year. There is still a lot of time for that. But yeah, I'm happy for Shubman, but at the same time I'm a bit disappointed for Rohit Sharma not being the captain," concluded Harbhajan.
