3 reasons why Shubman Gill replacing Rohit Sharma as India's ODI captain is the wrong move

Team India ace batter Shubman Gill has been officially appointed as the new ODI captain ahead of the upcoming tour of Australia. The opener replaces Rohit Sharma as the team management have made a massive statement regarding their vision and road map for the 2027 ODI World Cup.

Shubman Gill was Team India's vice-captain during their recent ODI assignments against England and during the 2025 Champions Trophy as well. Amid intense speculation regarding Rohit Sharma's long-term future, the selection committee have not beat around the bush to announce the massive change in the leadership dynamic.

Team India squad for three-match ODI series against Australia

Shubman Gill (Captain), Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer (VC), Axar Patel, KL Rahul (WK), Nitish Kumar Reddy, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Harshit Rana, Mohammed Siraj, Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna, Dhruv Jurel (WK), Yashasvi Jaiswal.

On that note, let us take a look at three reasons why Shubman Gill replacing Rohit Sharma as India's ODI captain is the wrong move.

#1 Leadership overload in the early stages of his captaincy career might prove to be counter-productive

Balancing a Test team going through a major transition, along with an ODI team that has hardly tasted defeat in recent times, with virtually no room for error, is a task and a half for any candidate in world cricket, and that includes a prodigal player like Shubman Gill.

Turning back the clock, Virat Kohli never had command of multiple formats until 2017, by which time he had nine years of experience under his belt. Rohit Sharma, on the other hand, got command in early 2022. MS Dhoni might be the sole exception in recent times in Indian cricket, but his entry into leadership duties arguably came under some unrepeatable special circumstances, and certainly in a way different time compared to now.

While Shubman Gill may be viewed as the torchbearer and have all the backing in the world by the management, having leadership roles across all formats at this stage of his career, might prove to be detrimental. He has had a superb start to his life as Test captain, both in terms of result and form, and to use that as a pathway to a full-time ODI captaincy role comes across as a knee-jerk reaction, and a tad greedy, because too much is being asked from Gill at the moment.

Instead, allowing Gill to make the most of his brilliant start as Test captain and easing him into the ODI leadership role would have been a much more practical approach.

#2 Being captain across multiple formats will make managing Gill's workload that much more difficult

Given the importance of each and every game from here on across formats, from the view of ICC Trophies, and Gill's presence in the leadership core across all formats, there is not a single international fixture where he can realistically be given a break. On top of all this, he is still one of India's premier batters at the top, and that importance, again, makes him one of the first names on the team sheet.

In a way, Gill is Team India's sole all-format player. Sure, Jasprit Bumrah, Kuldeep Yadav, and Arshdeep Singh feature in all formats, but they don't necessarily feature in all matches due to workload management or the team combination.

In a bid to extract the most out of him as a captain and a batter by tapping into his purple patch, India may have to pay the price in the long run should Gill be injured, overworked, and burnt out. Just the sheer amount of matches in the international cricket followed by two months of intense action in the IPL, does make it a realistic proposition, no matter how much supervision there is.

#3 Team India may have risked pulling the trigger way too soon

One of the facets that Ajit Agarkar stressed upon during the squad announcement press conference was to provide Shubman Gill time, and allow him to settle into the role of ODI captain in time for the 2027 ODI World Cup.

From a calendar's perspective, there is still over two years remaining, while from the FTP perspective, India have approximately 27 ODIs lined up till the end of 2026, purely from bilateral cricket. This figure is certainly not shabby compared to the dearth of ODI cricket of late, and also taking into account that India have only played 11 matches in the format since the start of 2024, and only six matches if only bilaterals are considered.

So that begs the question whether India have made a rash decision or not, since there was plenty of room to appoint Gill later on, once he has settled into his new roles in the Test and the T20I leadership core. Although any new captain would welcome as much time as possible to settle in before a major tournament, surely Gill, who is not entirely a stranger to leadership roles, won't need 27 ODIs to consider himself ready.