After winning a closely-contested series against England, India skipper Virat Kohli questioned the scheduling of the matches and hoped that the authorities will look into it.
“Scheduling needs to be looked at in the future, [especially] in these times. Because playing in bio-bubbles will be difficult, and everyone can’t have the same mental capacity all the time. I am sure things will be discussed in the future,” said the India skipper after he led his team to a 2-1 win in the ODI series on Sunday, which capped off a gruelling international calendar for his boys.
Immediately after the Indian Premier League T20 tournament that ended in November last year in UAE, India have been busy in full series with top international sides — Australia (away) and England (at home).
They have played eight Test matches, six ODIs and six T20 Internationals.
This year, Test matches and T20 Internationals needed to be given significance since there is the World Test Championship final which India will play in June as well as the T20 World Cup here in India in October-November.
The ODI matches are turning out to be an unnecessary disturbance.
Kohli was also unhappy with the man-of-the-match and man-of-the-series awards saying that they should have been given to Shardul Thakur (4/67 and 30 off 21 balls) and Bhuvneshwar Kumar (6 wickets in three matches and economy rate of 4.65) respectively. Jonny Bairstow was declared man of the series and Sam Curran was the man of the match.
“I am surprised Shardul wasn’t the man of the match, and Bhuvi (Bhuvneshwar Kumar) wasn’t the man of the series. These guys were the difference in middle overs and powerplay. A lot of credit to them for bowling in tough conditions,” he added.
The 32-year-old said that he was impressed by the depth of India’s batting.
“Death overs batting was extremely good. If the top three can get a hundred, then we can get scores in the range of 370 and 380. This win has been sweet because it’s against the top team in the world.”
