India will compete against England in the fifth and final scheduled test at Edgbaston, Birmingham. The match will kick off at 3 pm (Indian Standard Time). However, just ahead of the test match, Indian skipper Rohit Sharma returned a COVID positive on Saturday. As a result, the BCCI confirmed on the eve of the match that he had been ruled out of the match.
Thus, the board also decided to give the captaincy role to Jasprit Bumrah. Now the ace pacer will lead the Indian side against England in the fifth match. However, there were a few other names as well for the captaincy role. The appointment of Bumrah as a skipper has got the backing of some former cricketers.
Some of the ex-cricketers didn’t like this decision. Former Indian test opener, Wasim Jaffer, said that it would have been great if India had gone for Cheteswar Pujara as the captain of the side. Jaffer’s statement came after the BCCI named Bumrah as the Test team.
The former opener highlighted that Puraja has enough experience to lead the team. He also said that the right-hander has played 95 Test matches and that was enough to make him the captain. In a discussion on ESPN Cricinfo, making Bumrah the captain was the obvious choice because he was the vice-captain.
Jaffer added, “I have seen Pujara lead in first-class cricket. He is a decent enough leader. He has played 90 (95) odd Tests, so I feel it would have made more sense to go with him.”
The former opener also stated that after seeing the importance of the match, the management should have gone for Pujara. However, he also said that the pacer has great game sense and might surprise everyone with his captaincy, as Hardik Pandya did.
Notably, the Indian team is leading the Test series by 2-1 and needs this win to win the series and move an inch closer to the World Test Championship final. However, if they win this, it will be the first series win since 2007.
