Why was Suryakumar Yadav snubbed from West Indies Test squad? BCCI official reveals

Cheteshwar Pujara was dropped from the Test squad after his dismal WTC Final outing but former India captain Sunil Gavaskar took a massive dig at selectors for scapegoating the veteran amid a collective batting failure.

The exclusion of Sarfaraz Khan was also a hotly debated topic as people were baffled why a serial performer in domestic cricket like Sarfaraz, who has batted at an average of 80 in the domestic tournaments over the past two years was yet again overlooked.

India’s last bilateral Test assignment was against Australia in the Border Gavaskar Trophy, where Rohit Sharma and his men won the series 2-1.

Suryakumar Yadav has been a revelation for India in the T20 format. He has been a stellar performer for India in the white ball formats and scored a plethora of runs in 2022. The batter, who has repeatedly said his main aim is to play Tests for India, played a solitary match in the BGT but was subsequently dropped from the starting XI.

And he has been overlooked in the longer format for the West Indies series as well. A section of fans were bemused by the selection and demanded a justification for his snub after batting in just one inning.

But why exactly SKY has found himself out of the Indian Test team? A senior BCCI official explained the reason to InsideSport the reason for Suryakumar’s snub.

“It’s obvious that if Surya was in the squad, he would have played ahead of Ruturaj or Yashasvi. And the team wants to try someone new. But Surya is not out of Test plans yet. He is a very important player with Asia Cup and World Cup coming up so, he must focus on white-ball cricket for now. He will get his chance,” the BCCI official explained.

The 32-year-old has been an outstanding player in the T20Is, but has struggled in the ODI format. He has so far failed to replicate his T20 form and has scored at an average of just 24 in 21 innings for India.

But he will get a chance to further bolster his Test inclusion case if he performs well in the upcoming Duleep Trophy. The player was included in the West Zone squad for Duleep Trophy as he was one of the replacements for Yashasvi Jaiswal and Ruturaj Gaikwad, who get to board the Caribbean-bound flight.