Ruturaj Gaikwad, Abhishek Sharma snubbed as Hamilton Masakadza picks Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli's replacements in T20Is

Former Zimbabwe international Hamilton Masakadza believes that India won't struggle to find the replacements of Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli in T20I cricket. Masakadza named Shubman Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal as two possible replacements for the Indian legends in India's T20I set-up.

Recently, both the senior players Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma announced their retirement from T20Is after taking India to the T20 World Cup 2024 win. While Kohli announced his decision straight after the match, Rohit made the announcement during the post-match press conference. In another shock, another senior player Ravindra Jadeja also announced his retirement from T20Is a day later.

With three senior players retiring from the format, India will look to build a new core of players who can take the team forward. In the ongoing series against Zimbabwe, the players will be aiming to cement their places in the team.

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Hamilton Masakadza picks Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli's replacements in T20Is

During an exclusive interview with The Times of India, Hamilton Masakadza said that India has a big pool of players to replace Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma but also added that it will be difficult to find the players who can achieve that level of success.

"It is a big void, difficult to replace such players. But then again, with India, the pool of players is so wide and there's so much talent there. I'm sure India won't struggle to find players to replace them. But yeah, to find players who can reach the levels that those three did is going to be really difficult," Masakadza said.

The former Zimbabwe opener named Shubman Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal as two possible replacements for the Indian legends. He believes that these two players can be productive in all the formats of the game.

"I'm really looking forward to watching the growth and improvement, especially of Shubman Gill. I've watched a little bit of him in all three formats and I really love what I've seen. He's one player who can really step up to replace the guys who are leaving. Yashasvi (Jaiswal) as well. He started off brilliantly in his international career. So those are definitely a couple of players to look out for, players who can go a long way towards filling the huge void left by those world-class players," Masakadza explained.

Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli finished as top run-scorers in T20Is

Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli are the two modern-day greats of India. Both retired as the top run-scorers in the T20I format. While Rohit leads the run-charts with 4231 runs in 159 matches at an average of 32.05 and a strike rate of 140.89, Virat Kohli is second on the list with 4188 runs in 125 matches at an average of 48.69 and a strike rate of 137.04.

Both Shubman Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal are seen as the future of Indian cricket. Both the youngsters have already proven their abilities at this level. Gill has scored more than 2000 runs for India at an average of over 60 in ODIs. He is currently leading India in the T20I series against Zimbabwe.

On the other hand, Yashasvi Jaiswal has scored over 1000 runs in just nine Tests so far at an average of 68.53. Jaiswal is a valuable player in T20Is and is known for his ability to hit boundaries from the first ball.