Former Indian cricketer Dodda Ganesh feels picking Shivam Dube in place of Sanju Samson in ODIs is ridiculous. Samson scored a fine knock of 108 runs off 114 balls in his last ODI against South Africa and helped India post 296 runs on the board.
Furthermore, Samson scored a fine knock of 58 runs off 45 balls in the fifth T20I against Zimbabwe. While Samson was able to retain his place in the T20I squad for Sri Lanka tour, he could not get a spot in the ODI team.
Meanwhile, Shivam Dube has been picked in both teams. Dube was also preferred ahead of Samson in the T20 World Cup.
“Shivam Dube in place of Sanju Samson in the ODIs is ridiculous. Poor Sanju scored a century in his last series against SA. Why him always? My heart goes out to this young man #SLvIND,” wrote Ganesh on his X account.
On the other hand, Member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor slammed the Ajit Agarkar-led selection panel for dropping Sanju Samson from ODIs and Abhishek Sharma from T20I team. The left-hander also scored a blistering knock of 100 runs off just 47 balls in the second T20I against Zimbabwe but could not get a place in the T20I squad for the series against Sri Lanka.
“Interesting squad selection for India’s tour of Sri Lanka later this month. @IamSanjuSamson, who hit a century in his last ODI, has not been picked for ODIs, while @IamAbhiSharma4, who hit a T20I century in the #INDvZIM series, has not been picked at all. Rarely has success in India colours mattered so little to the selectors! Good luck to the team anyway,” tweeted Tharoor.
The first T20I between India and Sri Lanka will be played in Pallekele on July 27.
T20I Squad: Suryakumar Yadav (C), Shubman Gill (VC), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rinku Singh, Riyan Parag, Rishabh Pant (WK), Sanju Samson (WK), Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh, Khaleel Ahmed, Mohd. Siraj.
ODI Squad: Rohit Sharma (C), Shubman Gill (VC), Virat Kohli, KL Rahul (WK), Rishabh Pant (WK), Shreyas Iyer, Shivam Dube, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohd. Siraj, Washington Sundar, Arshdeep Singh, Riyan Parag, Axar Patel, Khaleel Ahmed, Harshit Rana.
