Did Ravichandran Ashwin just confirm Gautam Gambhir’s role in Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma’s Test retirements?

Almost a year since Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma announced their retirements from Test cricket, the decision is still highly debated. A huge chunk of their fans believe the call wasn’t theirs and was forced upon the two, either by the BCCI’s chairman of selectors, Ajit Agarkar, or by head coach Gautam Gambhir. Rohit and Kohli’s struggles in Test cricket had stretched for too long, their careers concluding with India’s awful 1-3 series defeat in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy Down Under. On May 7, Rohit announced on Instagram that he was retiring from Test cricket, followed by Kohli’s decision exactly five days later, on May 12

Now, 10 months later, Ravichandran Ashwin appears to have all but confirmed that Gambhir had a role to play in that decision. Speaking at the RevSportz Conclave Trailblazers, the former India spinner reflected on his mid-series Test retirement during the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, while also hinting that Gambhir wanted some of the senior players – including himself – to move on.

Also Read: Gautam Gambhir admits ‘mistakes’, reacts to ‘head coach vs Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma’ narrative

“If somebody has to have angst against Gautam, it’s me, right? I come out on his second or third tour as coach…” Ashwin quipped when asked how he would rate Gambhir.

“Gautam, the coach, has a job to do for me in many ways, and even if he thought that I must move on or Virat must move on or Rohit must move on, it’s okay; it’s fine because he has a job to do. And at that particular instance, if I felt bitter about it, that’s also okay because it’s my emotion. But if you detach yourself from that, it’s clear to me that he has a job to do, and maybe I do not have a future in his regime.”

“One of my strongest assets, I feel, is my ability to make decisions. Whether it’s right or wrong is for people to debate. But at the end of the day, it’s my life. I need to do it on my terms. The moment, I think, at Perth, when we had Jaddu and myself as the lead spinners in the side, and Washy played that game in Perth, and then the next game, again, I came in, and then I had to again make way, was kind of suggestive or indicative to me that my time was up. And if somebody else had to come and take up that place, by all means, they need their space and time. And I’m not one of those guys who will hang around, you know, wanting to see if I can make a comeback. I’ve had far too many. I’ve come far, far too much in my life to be able to, you know, dilly-dally around with all those things,” Ashwin added.

“I have always wanted to shed ego as the first thing in my life, and I’m still in the process of shedding ego. We all are human beings. It comes to us. But if you detach yourself, things do make sense. Sometimes, because of the adulation we get in this country, we do end up thinking that we are invincible, which is not the case.”