Legendary India cricketer Ravichandran Ashwin showed no mercy and slammed the selection committee for not picking Shreyas Iyer in the Men in Blue's Asia Cup squad. The India squad for the continental tournament was announced by Ajit Agarkar on Tuesday, Ausgust 19 and Shreyas' omission from the squad has become one of the biggest talking points.
The 30-year-old not only failed to make it to the 15-member squad, but also wasn't included in the reserve list either. The likes of Dhruv Jurel, Riyan Parag, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Prasidh Krishna, and Washington Sundar were preferred over Shreyas in the reserve list.
This came as a massive surprise as Shreyas had given stunning performances with the bat for the Punjab Kings in IPL 2025. The batter had finished as the highest run-getter of the side and the sixth-highest scorer overall in the tournament with 604 runs in 17 matches. He recorded six 50+ scores including the highest individual score of 97*.
Ashwin wasn't a fan of the selection committee snubbing Shreyas from the squad and called them out for their 'unfair' treatment towards the batter and also highlighted his brilliant performance in the IPL.
“Shreyas Iyer has solid credentials. He was out of the team, but he made you win the Champions Trophy. If you argue that Shubman Gill is in blasting form, then Shreyas is also in some fine form. Who will answer all these questions? What Shreyas has done wrong,” said Ashwin on his YouTube channel ‘Ash Ki Baat’.
“He did brilliantly well for KKR, made them win. He was sent into the auction. He then took Punjab to the finals for the first time since 2014. He overcame the short ball problem. He was hitting the likes of Kagiso Rabada and Jasprit Bumrah with ease in the IPL. I am just extremely sad for him and Yashasvi Jaiswal; it is extremely unfair,” Ashwin added.
Agarkar addressed Shreyas' snub from the squad
Agarkar also shared his take on Shreyas' omission from the squad and stated that it isn't the batter's fault that he hasn't got a place. He added that the 30-year-old will have to wait to become a member of India's T20I set-up once again.
"With regards to Shreyas, I mean, you need to tell him who he can replace. No fault of his, nor is it ours. It's just that we have to pick 15 at the moment; he'll have to wait for his chance," Agarkar said during the press-conference.
India's squad for Asia Cup 2025: Suryakumar Yadav (capt), Shubman Gill (vc), Abhishek Sharma, Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Jitesh Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah, Varun Chakravarthy, Arshdeep Singh, Kuldeep Yadav, Sanju Samson, Harshit Rana, Rinku Singh.