Gavaskar slams Dhoni and Dhawan's absence from domestic circuit

In a scathing interview with India Today, Indian batting great Sunil Gavaskar has publicly questioned the non-availability of Shikhar Dhawan and MS Dhoni for Delhi and Jharkhand respectively, during the on-going Ranji season.

"We shouldn't ask Dhawan and Dhoni 'Why you are not playing domestic cricket?'. We should, in fact, ask the BCCI and selectors why are they allowing players to skip domestic cricket when they are not on national duty," Gavaskar told India Today. "If the Indian team has to do well, players have to be in prime form and for that, they have to play cricket," he added.

While Shikhar Dhawan remains a mainstay in the limited-overs sides for India as he was the player of the tournament during the recently concluded three-match T20I series against Australia, he has seemingly lost his place in the Test squad for good. Despite having been given a long enough rope during the tour of England, Dhawan failed to come up with too many innings of substance. , Add to it the continued success of Prithvi Shaw and Mayank Agarwal at the domestic as well as 'A' level meant the selectors had to move beyond him.

As far as Dhoni is concerned, he was dropped out of the T20 side too. Now only regularly part of the ODI squad, Dhoni is short of match practice of late. Going into the World Cup, whether India can afford a Dhoni short of match practice is questionable.

"He (Dhoni) didn't play the T20Is against Australia, before that he didn't play the West Indies Tests, and then he is not playing the Test series against Australia," Gavaskar said. "So, he last played in October and will next play in January, which is a huge gap. But if he doesn't do well on tours of Australia and New Zealand, then there will be more questions asked on his place in the World Cup. As you grow older and if there is a gap in your [competitive] cricket, your reflexes will slow down. If you play any form of cricket at the domestic level, you get an opportunity to play long innings, which serves as a good practice for you," he concluded.