‘Didn’t discuss Surya for ODIs’: Agarkar

National chief selector Ajit Agarkar reckoned Suryakumar Yadav deserves the leadership role and hence has been appointed India captain for the threematch T20I series against Sri Lanka starting on July 27 in Pallekele However the former India pacer revealed that the star batterrsquos name was not even discussed in the selection meeting where they picked the Rohit Sharmaled 15member squad for the threematch ODI series against SL to be played from August 2 in ColomboNo spot availableRohit and Virat Kohli who had announced their retirement from the shortest format after Indiarsquos T20 World Cup triumph in the USA and West Indies recently are obviously key players but with Shreyas Iyer and KL Rahul who were part of the ODI World Cup team last year and Rishabh Pant returning to the 50over format Agarkar felt therersquos no space for Suryakumar in the middleorder in ODIs currentlyldquoNo we havenrsquot discussed Surya at this point in ODIs We have got Shreyas back KL is back theyrsquove had great World Cups Rishabh is back as well So there is some real quality in the middle order Surya has been a T20 playerrdquo Agarkar said at a press conference in reply to middayrsquos question on whether they discussed Suryakumarrsquos name during the ODI team selectionAlso ReadThose skillsets are hard to find Ajit on electing SKY over Pandya as skipperSuryakumar 33 has represented the country in 68 T20Is 37 ODIs and one Test so far Agarkar revealed how his committee decided to give the T20I captaincy to Suryakumar who has led in seven T20Is so far winning five ldquoSurya has been made captain because hersquos one of the deserving candidates We get a lot of feedback from the dressing room He has a good cricket brain Hersquos still one of the best T20I batters in the world You want a captain who can play all gamesrdquo Agarkar saidFormer Test opener and Indiarsquos new head coach Gautam Gambhir who will be beginning a new innings with the national team in Sri Lanka hinted that in future therersquos a possibility of different teams for the three formatsThree different teamsldquoGoing forward these things can happen Virat Rohit and Ravindra Jadeja are not there in T20Is Right now you can say there will be three different teams T20 cricket is going through a transition but in the 50over format and Test cricket consistency is key We can find players who play these two formats consistentlyrdquo Gambhir remarkedAgarkar echoed the same feelings ldquoWe are on the same page If you have players who can play all three formats then we include them because that means they are quality playersrdquo Agarkar lavished praise on opener Shubman Gill who led Indiarsquos young team to a 41 series win over Zimbabwe recently and considered him a future leadership prospect Gill was appointed vicecaptain to Suryakumar and Rohit in both the T20I and ODI teams respectively for the SL tourlsquoGill is threeformat playerrsquoldquoShubman is a guy we feel is a threeformat player firstly and seems to show a lot more qualities over the last year or so that we hear from the dressing room And thatrsquos what we want to try and have somebody who can also learn from a couple of the senior guys there Surya in this instance or Rohit who is still around So we donrsquot face the same challenges of trying to look for a captain in case there are injuries or loss of form somewhere Hersquos shown some decent leadership qualities and we want to try and get him the experience going forwardrdquo Agarkar remarked