Discarded Indian Cricketers Who Should Announce Their Retirement From International Cricket

The bench strength of the Indian Cricket Team is at an all-time high at the moment and this has been testified to the hilt in the past 7-8 months during the Australian Test series where the fringe players showcased their potential to the hilt and also, during the recent squad selection for the white-ball tour of Sri Lanka.

The brimming bench strength also means that once you get dropped from the set-up, it is very difficult to regain your spot back thanks to the sheer competition between players for a place in the playing 11.

This also means that discarded Indian cricketers, who haven’t played international cricket for a while, face an uphill task to come into national reckoning.

Here’s a look at discarded Indian cricketers who should announce their retirement from international cricket:

Stuart Binny

Stuart Binny still holds the record for the best individual figures by an Indian in ODI cricket.

The right-handed seam-bowling all-rounder claimed a barely believable 4/6 against Bangladesh in 2014.

But, it is fair to say that Binny will never play for the national side again. The all-rounder, who was picked in the Indian 2015 World Cup squad ahead of Yuvraj Singh, last featured for the national team in a T20I against the West Indies in 2016.

Binny featured in 6 Tests, 14 ODIs, and 3 T20Is between 2014-16, and with him being no way near national reckoning, its fitting that the 37-year-old  announces his retirement from international cricket.

Amit Mishra

When Amit Mishra burst on the scene during the 2008 home Test series against Australia, the prodigiously talented leg-spinner was pipped as a long-term option for Team India.

But a combination of poor fitness, inconsistent performances, and the subsequent emergence of the duo of Ashwin and Jadeja meant that the leg-spinner was never able to nail a permanent spot in the team.

Mishra last played for India in a T20I against England in 2017 and while he still continued to take wickets in the IPL, it is fair to say that his India days are behind him and he should consider calling it quits from international cricket.

Dinesh Karthik

Dinesh Karthik has made so many comebacks during his stop-start 17-year international career that one can never rule out Tamil Nadu from another national reckoning.

But, as things stand, it will take something outrageous for him to play for India again.

Karthik, who made a return to the Indian team across all three formats in 2018, was unceremoniously dropped from all three formats after India lost the 2019 World Cup semi-final against New Zealand.

He hasn’t been handed a central contract in the past two years, and the fact that he wasn’t even considered in India’s 2nd-string squad for the upcoming Sri Lankan series tells you how far he has fallen in the pegging order.

Karthik is still optimistic about making another comeback but as things stand currently, it’s looking increasingly impossible that we will ever see him don the national colors again.

Murali Vijay

Murali Vijay will go down in history as one of India’s best opening batter in Test cricket but it is fair to say that we may have seen the last of the stylish Tamil Nadu cricketer in Indian colors.

Vijay was India’s best batter along with Ajinkya Rahane during the 2014-15 overseas Test cycle but he failed to emulate the same during the subsequent visits to SENA countries in 2018.

After successive failures in South Africa, England, and Australia,  Murali Vijay was dropped from the Test team post the 2018 Perth Test.

With so many opening batters vying for a place in the Test team and the fact that Vijay is on the wrong side of 35, it’s unlikely that we will ever see the stylish batter play for India again. It’s only fitting that he calls time on his internal career.

Harbhajan Singh

Harbhajan Singh made his international debut as a teenager in 1998 and for the better part of the next 13 years, he was one of India’s biggest match-winners in both formats of the game.

The first Indian to take a Test hat-trick, Harbhajan Singh is one of the 4 Indian bowlers to claim 400 Test wickets to go along with 269 and  25 ODI and T20I wickets respectively.

Harbhajan lost his place in the team in 2011 and the emergence of the likes of Ashwin and Jadeja and his inability to put up consistent performances meant that he could never cement a permanent place in the side.

He made a few comebacks in the team and his later international appearance came in a T20I in Bangladesh in 2016. Harbhajan is over 40-years-old and barring the IPL, he no longer plays competitive cricket. It’s about time that the ‘turbanator’ officially draws curtains on his stellar international career.

Kedar Jadhav

Jadhav was a street-smart batsman who adapted his game as per the demand of the situation and during the course of the next 2.5 years, he orchestrated a plethora of match-winning heists for Team India.

Jadhav became a pivotal part of the team, as, along with his batting, he regularly chipped in with the ball as a 6th option. 

Unfortunately,  after a poor performance against England in the 2019 World Cup, he was dropped from the playing 11 for the semi-final.

Jadhav, who scored 1389 runs in 52 ODI innings at an average of 42.09 and 101.61, played his last game for the national team during the 2020 ODI series against New Zealand.

With age not on his side, Jadhav’s chances of making a comeback are bleak and it would be fitting if he calls time on his international career.

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