Former India captain Kris Srikkanth lambasted the selection committee for omitting Shreyas Iyer from the Men in Blue's squad for Asia Cup. Srikkanth also wasn't a fan of the reason that Ajit Agarkar gave for leaving out Shreyas and labelled his statement as 'nonsensical'. Notably, not only was the 30-year-old not selected in the squad, but he was also not included in the reserve list either.
Agarkar, who is the chief of the selection committee, had announced India's 15-member squad for the continental tournament on Tuesday through a press-conference. When asked about the reason behind not picking Shreyas, Agarkar highlighted that the batter wasn't at fault for his omission from the team. He even went on to counter the question, asking who Shreyas could have replaced in the squad that was picked.
"Again no fault of his. Got to tell me who he can replace? At the moment, will have to wait for his chance," Agarkar said during the press-conference.
Srikkanth stated that judging by the recent matches, Shreyas should have been an 'automatic choice' for a spot in India's squad. He further highlighted the latter's stunning performance with the bat in IPL 2025 for the Punjab Kings.
“On current form, Shreyas Iyer is an automatic choice. Let’s be very clear. You need to look at recent matches; there’s no point judging a player by form from a year ago. He scored 600 runs in the IPL at a strike rate of 175. Strike rate is the most important factor here,” Srikkanth said on his YouTube channel.
“He has been brilliant. Yet you have left him out. You’ve confused him now. For a player who has performed so well, you are saying: ‘tell me who he will replace in the side’. I cannot understand this statement. It’s a nonsensical statement from Agarkar. Totally nonsensical. I don’t agree with him," he added.
Srikkanth also questioned the selection of some other players
The former India cricketer didn't stop there and stated that he doesn't understand the logic behind picking the likes of Shivam Dube, Rinku Singh and Sanju Samson into the squad but not Shreyas.
“You can accommodate Shivam Dube, Rinku Singh and Sanju Samson, but there’s no place for Shreyas Iyer. What is this statement? I cannot understand the logic behind this. There’s no logic at all,” Srikkanth stated.
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.