The sudden retirement of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma from the Indian Test team shook the entire world.
The sudden retirement of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma from the Indian Test team shook the entire world. The two stalwarts of Indian cricket abruptly called time on their respective Test careers in May 2025, days before the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy against England. There are many theories and reports which stated that poor outings in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against Australia may have prompted the two to hang their boots but now, former India cricketer Karsan Ghavri has given a whole new prospective to this row.
Ghavri stated that both Rohit and Kohli wanted to continue playing for India in the longest format but due to the “internal politics” in the BCCI, forced them to walk out.
“He [Kohli] should have definitely continued playing for India easily, probably for another couple of years. But something really forced him to retire. And unfortunately, when he retired, he was not even given a farewell by the BCCI,” said Ghavri on the Vickey Lalwani Show.
“Such players, such a great player who has done such great service to BCCI, India cricket and Indian fans, should be given a grand and fabulous farewell,” he added.
He further held the selection panel responsible for the “premature” retirement of Rohit and Virat from Test cricket.
“It’s due to internal politics within the BCCI, which is hard to understand. And I think this is the reason he retired prematurely. Even Rohit Sharma retired prematurely. They were asked to go out,” said Ghavri.
“It’s not like they wanted to leave. They wanted to continue. But the selectors and BCCI had different ideas. It was a matter of some kind of petty politics,” he added.
Apart from this, there are reports stating that the duo may also retire from ODIs soon, ending their dream of playing the World Cup in 2027.
