Explained: India tour of WI | Sympathies with Cheteshwar Pujara but the right call made

Truly, Cheteshwar Pujara remains the last of the Test specialists in the modern-day era where batters do not hesitate to go bang-bang from the word go. In an era with unparallel demand for quick scoring be it any format, Pujara remains one from the old school of cricket; making his presence more significant in the longer version of the game. 

Nonetheless, whenever questions have been raised on India’s famed batters’ struggle for form, Pujara has been an easy target for critics. Call it his defensive approach, fitness issues, strike-rate woes (yes, even that is taken into account in red-ball cricket in modern times) or his stature being less than big-ticket players such as Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, the Saurashtra-born batter has more often than not paid the price.

However, Pujara also enjoyed a lengthy rope in India’s Test squad despite dwindling returns since his standout performances in the 2018/19 series against hosts Australia. Since India’s first-ever Test series win in Australia, where Pujara ended with 521 runs including three hundreds, the right-hander has struggled for consistency. He has added only one more three-figure knock under his belt, which came last December in Bangladesh (102 not out).

Pujara has only struck 15 fifties, in 62 innings, since the 2018-19 Australia tour. Thus, a long run of below-par performances have hogged his esteemed Test career. India have been unlucky to witness the fall of Rahane, Kohli, and Pujara at the same time. But, the axe has only fallen on Rahane and Pujara. Interestingly, the latter was offered a central contract for October-September 2022-23 while Rahane wasn’t. But Rahane will board India’s flight for the West Indies, where they play two Tests starting on July 12, whereas Pujara has been dropped after the squad was announced on Friday (June 23).

In the 16-member squad, the BCCI selectors backed a plethora of youngsters such as Yashasvi Jaiswal, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Mukesh Kumar, and Ishan Kishan. Thus, the transition period has certainly kicked off in India’s Test line-up after the WTC final post-mortem (where India lost the Test mace to Australia by 209 runs early this month in London). 

Unsurprisingly, Pujara has been the first victim among batters as his twin failures in the WTC summit clash (with scores of 14 and 27) intensified his omission talks. We are in an era in world cricket where England’s Bazball is headlining the format. Ben Stokes-Brendon McCullum-led England have adopted a fearless approach, batting at over 4.5 runs per over (RPO), and coming up with funky field sets. With India losing the WTC final twice in a row, tough decisions were set to be made. In this aspect, Pujara’s slow burn approach has been overlooked.

Pujara’s approach has resulted in many hard-fought and dominating wins for Team India in whites since his debut in 2010. He has stood rock solid and bailed India out of crisis by taking body blows, concentrating hard each ball, and trusting his defense. However, his methods have been proven outdated with the rise of young blokes (Jaiswal, Gaikwad, Sarfaraz Khan, etc.). Pujara has never been the quickest between wickets. Age is also not at his side (he is 35). On the other hand, Rahane’s 89 and 46 and Kohli’s 49 (not that his place will ever come under the scanner) in the WTC final coincided with his flop show; leading to his exit.

It is to be noted that Pujara’s numbers versus spin isn’t encouraging. He has never been comfortable against the moving deliveries but has also been dismissed by spinners on 19 occasions since 2019 (scoring 910 at a decent 47.89). He averaged over 70 (71.51) versus the spin bowlers till 2010-2018. One might say it is a lost battle now. However, never say never. Rahane wasn’t even in India’s WTC final scheme of things till Shreyas Iyer got injured. Now, he has regained the vice-captaincy tag for the West Indies series.

Overall, Pujara’s road ahead looks extremely tough. As per reports in the Times of India, he is set to feature in this year’s Duleep Trophy. His appetite for runs, hunger for batting, and love for Test cricket is second to none. Thus, Pujara’s days are not over yet. He is a fighter by all means. The right-hander won’t back down so easily. Nonetheless, his current omission looks like a start towards the future. Given his below-par returns since 2019, playing style, and fitness, it does seem to be the right call.

Thus, the phasing out of seniors has begun with Pujara’s ouster. India will kick off their all-format tour of West Indies on July 12. They play two Tests, on July 12 and July 20 respectively. 

TEST Squad: Rohit Sharma (Capt), Shubman Gill, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Virat Kohli, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Ajinkya Rahane (VC), KS Bharat (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), R Ashwin, R Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Axar Patel, Mohd. Siraj, Mukesh Kumar, Jaydev Unadkat, Navdeep Saini.