Vikram Rathour warns Gautam Gambhir of transition, names 2 young superstars to replace Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli in all formats

Former India batting coach Vikram Rathour talked about how transition should take place in the India National Cricket Team. He stated that it won't be easy to replace Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli and the transition should be done gradually.

The transition phase in the Indian team has begun in the T20I cricket. This comes after Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli ended their career in the shortest format of the game after winning the T20 World Cup 2024. Along with them, Ravindra Jadeja retired too and this now makes room for a lot of youngsters to step in.

The transition phase started in the recently concluded T20I series against Zimbabwe National Cricket Team. Plenty of youngsters were given opportunities to play under the leadership of Shubman Gill and they won the series by the margin of 4-1 to make the new era in Indian cricket.

The likes of Abhishek Sharma, Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and others are there in line now. They have been playing good cricket in whatever opportunities they have got and have given the impression that Indian cricket is in safe hands.

While talking about the transition phase, Vikram Rathour stated that the team for the Zimbabwe tour gave glimpses into how the team will look in the future. He said that there is a lot of depth in Indian cricket but transition needs to be done in a manner. Speaking to PTI, he explained:

"It is never going to be easy to replace people of Rohit and Virat's calibre. The recently concluded [T20I] series against Zimbabwe gave us some glimpse into how the T20 team will look in future. But we still have a few years in Test and ODI cricket to get to that point."

"I won't be too concerned about it [the transition]. We have a lot of depth in Indian cricket. There are lots of very talented and skilful players who are coming through the system. The only thing we need to make sure is the transition is done in a controlled manner. It needs to be gradual."

I am hoping that by then, players like Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Dhruv Jurel will establish themselves and will make the transition smooth - Vikram Rathour

Vikram Rathour further backed Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel, and some other young players to establish themselves. He feels that Jaiswal and Gill will be the two players to lead the team with the bat in all three formats once Rohit and Kohli retire from cricket entirely. He explained:

"I am hoping that by then, players like Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel, to name a few, would establish themselves and will make the transition smooth. In ODIs also, we have experienced players like Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul and Hardik Pandya to take over.

"There are many exciting players coming through but these two [Gill and Jaiswal] are equipped to play all three formats for a long time. They are going to be the backbone of Indian batting in years to come," he concluded.