Former India cricket team chief selector K Srikkanth has lamented the exclusion of Ruturaj Gaikwad from the squad for the IND vs NZ ODI series. The Maharashtra captain, who scored a century in the IND vs SA 2nd ODI, failed to retain his spot in the squad as Shubman Gill and Shreyas Iyer returned to the side. Echoing the sentiments of S Badrinath, Srikkanth questioned why Gaikwad was left out while Nitish Kumar Reddy was named a part of the 15-member side.
What should Gaikwad do to return to ODIs?
In a video on his YouTube channel, Srikkanth claimed that the only way for Gaikwad to get selected in the ODI team was to perhaps start wicketkeeping like his CSK teammate MS Dhoni. The former Indian selector claimed that the Maharashtra star should have been in the squad for the IND vs NZ ODI series in place of Nitish Reddy. Srikkanth claimed that Ruturaj would now have to start from the scratch and score more runs as the selectors had forgotten his prowess and he had to do so by scoring big runs in domestic cricket.
“Maybe Ruturaj Gaikwad can say I’ve played with Dhoni so I can also keep. That’s the only way he might get selected in the team. Shreyas Iyer is a certainty, so he should have been included. But Ruturaj Gaikwad should have been in the 15. Instead of having Nitish Kumar Reddy, keep him in the 15,” said Srikkanth.
Gaikwad has featured in 9 ODIs so far and has managed to score 228 runs, including one century and one fifty. He played one 50-over format in 2022 – the year of his debut – followed by 5 in 2023 and 3 in 2025. While he did well to fill in the shoes of Iyer in the series against SA, he has been snubbed and now finds himself once again at the back of the line.
“It’s very unfair. The whole idea of performance in an international match goes to waste. An effortless century like that is going to waste. Memory is short for everybody, so they’ll forget it soon,” Srikkanth added.
