Former Indian cricket team spinner R Ashwin slammed the team management for dropping Kuldeep Yadav for the first ODI encounter against Australia in Perth on Sunday. Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma both failed to impress on their return as India slumped to a narrow loss. India played three all-rounders in Nitish Kumar Reddy, Axar Patel and Washington Sundar. As a result, they had no space for Kuldeep and despite having batting depth, the Shubman Gill-led side could only manage 136 in 26 overs. Ashwin was not happy with India’s team selection and pointed out how Kuldeep would have been effective in big grounds like Perth.

“I can understand why they’re playing two spinners in the game along with Nitish Reddy, they want the batting depth because both Washington and Axar can bat. But man, at least give some attention to the bowling too. On these big grounds, if Kuldeep can’t bowl with a lot of freedom, where will he bowl then? And there’s going to be over spin which will help him get bounce as well,” Ashwin said on YouTube.

“They will talk about this batting depth. But if you want to build your game around batting depth, then the batters have to take responsibility, right? It’s the job of the batters to score the runs. If you’re playing an extra batter, it’s again about shielding the batters. Play your best bowlers I’ll always say this play your best bowlers. Don’t pick a team just to extend your batting,” he added.

Ashwin even questioned the call to include three all-rounders in the playing XI.

“How many all-rounders do you need? You already have three all-rounders. There was a time when there were no all-rounders. You’ve got Washington, you’ve got Axar, and you’ve got Nitish. With all this, if you still can’t play your best spinner, I don’t get it at all,” he said.