Veteran Indian spinner Ravichandran Ashwin has made a massive call up for IPL captaincy ahead of IPL 2024. The season begins with CSK taking on RCB at Chepauk on March 22.
Rajasthan Royals, who were the inaugural champions of the league, begin their campaign against Lucknow Super Giants on March 24 in Jaipur. They will then play at home on March 28. They will next take on Mumbai Indians on April 1 at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai, followed by the last match of the first phase against RCB at home also on March 6.
Ashwin has had a lot of success with the Rajasthan Royals since he joined them in IPL 2022. He picked up 12 wickets for the Royals in IPL 2022 and 14 in IPL 2023. The veteran spinner has just come off a winning Test series against England taking 26 wickets in the series, the most of any bowler in the series.
Ravichandran Ashwin shares his thoughts on IPL captaincy
Recently, in his YouTube video, Ashwin talked about why IPL franchises should choose their captain before the auction. He justified his point by following the example of KL Rahul. He spoke about how lost Rahul was when he led the Punjab Kings instead of captaining the Lucknow Super Giants for the last two seasons.
“Although KL Rahul started his captaincy very normally in Kings XI, he went to LSG, handpicked his own players and showed what he can do.”
“This is something I profess. Even when I became the captain of the Kings XI, the team was already chosen and they decided that I should be the captain after the auction.” Ashwin said on his YouTube channel.
Furthermore, he asked franchises to give captains the freedom to choose players as they wanted. This is somewhat similar to what Gautam Gambhir did in the auction after returning to KKR.
“But when a captain chooses his side during an auction, it is different because he is the one who will play with them, will take responsibility for his actions and will know their fallacies.”
Ashwin further recalled his conversation with KL Rahul when he said that even if the franchise is not doing well, it helps the captain identify his mistakes and be better prepared next season. Rahul has led by example for LSG so far, leading the team to the last 16 in the last two years.
“The captain will have better control there. I also spoke to KL about it. He said that in this case he would realize his mistake if he played with people he felt comfortable with. Like-for-like replacements are much more thoughtful and clear, is what he said. So has that made a difference in his captaincy period? Has it been fruitful for KL? Of course” Ashwin concluded.
Rahul has been out of the Indian team since the first Test against England in Hyderabad. He went to London for treatment for his quadriceps injury and will join the franchise for IPL 2024.
Lucknow Super Giants squad for IPL 2024
KL Rahul (c), Quinton de Kock, Nicholas Pooran, Ayush Badoni, Kyle Mayers, Marcus Stoinis, Deepak Hooda, Devdutt Padikkal, Ravi Bishnoi, Naveen-ul-Haq, Krunal Pandya, Yudhvir Singh, Prerak Mankad, Yash Thakur, Amit Mishra, Mark Wood, Mayank Yadav, Mohsin Khan, K. Gowtham, Shivam Mavi, Arshin Kulkarni, M. Siddharth, Ashton Turner, David Willey, Mohd. Arshad Khan
Also Read: Revealed: Why Shane Watson turned down Pakistan head coach job despite PCB meeting all demands