SA Team Selection: Virat Kohli's ODI captaincy, Ishant Sharma's place in Test, back-up No. 3 up for discussion

Virat Kohli's position as India's ODI captain, his Test deputy Ajinkya Rahane's future as vice-captain in the longest format along with 100-Test man Ishant Sharma's place will be up for discussion when the national selectors pick the jumbo squad for the tour of South Africa later this week.

Chairman of selectors Chetan Sharma, Abey Kuruvilla and Sunil Joshi are here watching the Mumbai Test and sometime during this week, they will sit alongside president Sourav Ganguly and secretary Jay Shah to take a few decisions which might have far-reaching impact in the larger context of Indian cricket.

India are supposed to play three ODIs in South Africa and the biggest question now is whether the country needs two white ball captains which can potentially lead to clash of ideas.


Rohit Sharma is already the T20 captain and with the blue riband 2023 50-over World Cup not far off, there are louder voices in the BCCI corridors to have one white ball captain -- and that is Rohit.

"As of now, it looks difficult that Virat would be able to keep his ODI captaincy but since ODI isn't important this year with very few matches here and there, one can think of delaying the decision," a senior BCCI source told PTI.

"But the counter argument is that why do you want to have separate ideas for two formats and if majority of people in charge of making decision feel that Rohit is the man going forward and will get time to prepare a team for 2023 event," he said.