Virat Kohli’s decision to relinquish the 20-overs captaincy resulted in him being removed as India’s one-day skipper as selectors did not want to have two different white-ball captains, Board of Cricket Control of India (BCCI) chief Sourav Ganguly said.
Opener Rohit Sharma took over as one-day cap-tain on Wednesday, a month after succeeding Kohli as T20 skipper following their disappointing World Cup campaign.
The board, which rarely explains even routine decisions, did not even mention Kohli by name in conveying the leadership change in a single sen-tence at the bottom of a press release announcing the Test squad for the upcoming tour of South Af-rica.
“The board and selectors had asked Virat to re-think his decision to quit T20 captaincy. He had declined the suggestion at the time,” former captain Ganguly told Friday’s Times of India newspaper.
“The selectors were uncomfortable with the idea of having two captains for white-ball cricket.” India reached the semi-finals of the 50-overs World Cup in 2019 under Kohli but exited from the group stage at this year’s Twenty20 World Cup. —AFP
