Former India captain Dilip Vengsarkar heavily criticised the selectors for snubbing Yashasvi Jaiswal from the 2026 T20 World Cup squad. The left-hand batter, who hasn't featured in a T20I since July 2024, was once again not able to find a place in the squad. Though the selection committee did decide to drop Shubman Gill for the mega-tournament, they opted to pick Ishan Kishan instead of Jaiswal.
Vengsarkar pointed out that Jaiswal has been in top form across all the three formats and questioned the selectors for not picking him in the squad for such an important competition. Notably, Jaiswal had recently smashed a superb hundred for Mumbai against Haryana in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, proving once again that he does have what it takes to deliver in the shortest format.
“It is unfortunate that Yashasvi is being left out time and again for no fault of his. He has been in tremendous form across all formats of the game, and I don’t know what else he has to do to get into the team," Vengsarkar said, as quoted by PTI.
Vengsarkar's verdict on Gill being dropped
However, Vengsarkar also agreed with the selection committee's decision of dropping Gill for the T20 World Cup. But, he opined that they should have decided to pick Jaiswal instead of Kishan.
“They are all excellent players, but I am with the selection committee when they judge players on the basis of current form and fitness. The current form does play an important role in the context of selection. And if you ask whom I would have picked instead of Gill, my choice would have been Jaiswal. He has proven time and again what a class performer he is and has always given the team the kind of starts required these days," he added.
Jaiswal's numbers in T20Is
Jaiswal does have a decent amount of experience when it comes to T20Is and has so far played 23 matches for India in the format. He has a total of 723 runs under his belt, including a century and five half-centuries. He also has a phenomenal strike-rate of 164.31. Despite his promising numbers, the 23-year-old hasn't played for the Men in Blue in the format for well over a year now.
India's squad for 2026 T20 World Cup: Suryakumar Yadav (c), Abhishek Sharma, Tilak Varma, Sanju Samson, Shivam Dube, Ishan Kishan, Hardik Pandya, Arshdeep Singh, Jasprit Bumrah, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Rinku Singh.