Last Updated:
Mohammad Kaif urges India to drop Shubman Gill despite his vice-captaincy, calling for no double standards and backing Sanju Samson for a good run.
Shubman Gill was out for a golden duck in Mullanpur. (PTI Photo)
Former international Mohammad Kaif has advised India to think about dropping Shubman Gill from the T20I side for the rest of the continuing five-match series against South Africa. Kaif said Gill’s vice-captaincy status shouldn’t are available the way in which of the team’s interest, and that there shouldn’t be any ‘double standards’ either.
Gill returned to the T20I side as an opener within the 2025 Asia Cup. To create space for him, India pushed the in-form Samson to the middle-order. Each players struggled in the brand new roles, but only Samson was dropped.
Gill has yet to attain a half-century or hit greater than two sixes in a match. His latest dismissal was a golden duck at home within the second T20I of the South Africa series.
“Take a look at how he’s getting out, caught at slip, stepping out and mistiming, trying aggressive strokes like Abhishek Sharma and getting caught,” Kaif said on his YouTube channel. “He has tried every part. I feel the time has come to provide him a break and take a look at players who’re proven. Sanju Samson is a top-quality player; he hasn’t received enough possibilities. There mustn’t be double standards. Even vice-captains have been dropped before. Whether it is within the team’s interest to rest Gill and produce in another person, there’s nothing mistaken with it.”
Kaif said it was ‘clearly visible’ that just some players get prolonged runs within the team while others should contend with ‘only a few possibilities’.
“But now it seems like the time has come for changes. You dropped players like Jaiswal, you kept Sanju Samson on the bench without giving him consistent possibilities, though he scored heavily as an opener. He hit three centuries in five T20 innings, something nobody in history has done. Some players get only a few possibilities, while others get prolonged runs because you must settle them within the team. That’s clearly visible. But now, I feel the pressure has increased a lot that it’s time for a change somewhere,” he added.
India and South Africa play the third T20I in Dharamsala on Sunday.
Click here so as to add News18 as your selected news source on Google. December 13, 2025, 09:10 IST
Read More