Cricket News: India miss a trick by not resting and rotating players in the ODI series against Bangladesh

On the one hand, it makes sense – India’s cricket schedule is among the most relentless in the world, saying something, so the rest and rotation help keep critical players fresh while blooding young talent for the future. 

On the other hand, it often leads to a lack of continuity. It ensures that India’s core players only play together in an extensive series of ICC tournaments – which is counterproductive in so many ways. 

However, there is a legitimate case for using the rest and rotation policy – but only against certain opposition. 

India’s decision to use the New Zealand tour as the time to give senior pros a rest seems questionable. 

Despite their relatively diminutive stature in world cricket, New Zealand is a force to be reckoned with. They’ve made it to the semis in the 2015 World Cup, 2019 World Cup, 2021 T20 World Cup, and 2022 T20 World Cup. 

That’s not counting the World Test Championship final in 2021, which they also won. So despite New Zealand being one of the smaller cricket countries – in terms of population – they are a formidable side. 

So using a tour to this country to rest your top professionals seems problematic. And it was demonstrated in the results. 

India may have won the T20I series, but that featured one washout and one DLS-affected match, which bizarrely ended in a tie – and only one win. 

The ODI series was even shortened, as two of the three matches were washed out – but the one match that didn’t see India eat a loss. 

So a tough series against a top-quality side saw India rotate critical players – but these same players are now back for the tour of Bangladesh. 

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">If the long term plan is to look at Rahul to keep wickets at the World Cup, he must keep in virtually every game from now and, ideally, in the IPL <a href="https://t.co/umbXAcx5OJ">https://t.co/umbXAcx5OJ</a></p>&mdash; Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) <a href="https://twitter.com/bhogleharsha/status/1599289547426516992?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 4, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Now, no disrespect to Bangladesh, but they are not in the same league as the Kiwis. In recent times, Bangladesh have been in transition, with older pros on the way out and younger players attempting to fill that void – with varying degrees of success. 

And given the conditions in Bangladesh would be similar to Indian states, this presented itself as a better tour to the rest key players. 

The cynical would argue that India have done that too, in a way – Yuzvendra Chahal, Suryakumar Yadav, and Hardik Pandya are not part of the ODI side for the Bangladesh tour. 

However, the more significant points of focus are the likes of KL Rahul, Rohit Sharma, and Virat Kohli. And it’s fair to say they would have benefitted more from going to New Zealand than they will be playing in Bangladesh. 

Yet what seemed like the ideal option wasn’t chosen by the board, leaving many wondering what exactly the logic is behind taking such decisions in the first place.