“Don’t give the false hope to that person” - Robin Uthappa blasts team management for not giving a single match to Indian batter in BGT 2024-25

Former Indian cricketer Robin Uthappa called out the team management for not giving a single chance to batter Abhimanyu Easwaran during the Border Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2024-25.

Notably, with Rohit Sharma missing the first Test, Devdutt Padikkal was called upon to replace him and open the innings. Padikkal was not part of the original squad and was brought in over Abhimanyu Easwaran, who was part of the original squad.

Robin Uthappa implied that Easwaran not getting chances despite performing consistently in domestic cricket is unfair. He blasted the team management, saying it is not right to give false hope to a player.

“He is scoring 1000 runs in every year in the domestic cricket. If you are playing him then don’t give the false hope to that person," he said in his interview with The Lallantop.

Further, Uthappa took another dig at the management, saying they should tell him directly if they do not want to give him chances.

“Abhimanyu Easwaran could have become a Pujara on this tour. He didn’t get any chance. Just tell him on the face that you don’t belong to the international cricket and you keep scoring runs in domestic cricket," Uthappa added.

Moreover, Robin Uthappa compared Easwaran's situation to that of Karun Nair. Karun was dropped from the Indian Test team after scoring a triple hundred.

“There are so many players, Karun Nair was dropped after scoring a triple century. He didn’t do well in the two Tests and he was dropped. It was a shocker," he said.

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Robin Uthappa deems not taking Cheteshwar Pujara to Australia a big miss

India's 3-1 series defeat in the BGT 2024-25 was largely because of the failure of the batting unit to perform consistently. They missed having an experienced batter in the side.

Robin Uthappa stated that India not taking someone like Cheteshwar Pujara to Australia was a big miss for the team.

“Not taking Cheteshwar Pujara to Australia was a big miss. They could have picked someone like the caliber of Pujara," he said.

Pujara has had a successful record in Australia, having scored 993 runs from 11 innings at an average of 47.28 with three hundreds and five half-centuries.