Ashwin Says Keep Kohli and Rohit for South Africa — but Calls It a Marriage

Virat Kohli is hobbling around with a rare semimembranosus tendon tear from the IPL final. Hardik Pandya just broke down during his own fitness test. Jasprit Bumrah is being bubble-wrapped for England. India are about to play three ODIs against Afghanistan without half their World Cup spine. And into this wreckage walks R Ashwin with a message that cuts against the prevailing doom: keep them both.

"I see no reason why they mustn't be there," Ashwin said on ESPNcricinfo, speaking about Kohli and Rohit Sharma's futures in the 50-over format ahead of the 2027 World Cup in South Africa. "They make your team definitely stronger."

It sounds like a simple take. It isn't. Because Ashwin — who retired from international cricket in December 2024 and knows exactly what the end of the road looks like — didn't just say "pick them." He laid out the conditions under which it works. And in doing so, gave the most nuanced public assessment of India's ageing-core dilemma that anyone has offered.

Ashwin's framing was deliberate. He compared the player-management dynamic to a marriage — both sides need to want it, both sides need to put in the work. The implication is obvious: if the BCCI and the coaching staff aren't fully invested in building a programme around keeping Kohli and Rohit fit and available through to October 2027, it won't happen. Talent alone isn't enough when you're 37 and 39.

"But if there is a thinking that it might steer the other way, the players will be under duress," Ashwin warned. "And if there is good vibes from the other half, the players will manage to make it. So I think it's a bit of a give and take. Good energy from both sides is very critical."

Read between the lines: Ashwin is saying that the biggest risk to Kohli and Rohit's World Cup participation isn't their bodies — it's the atmosphere around them. If the selectors, the coach, or the BCCI start hedging, the players will feel it. And ageing superstars who sense they're being managed out don't produce their best cricket.

Ashwin made a pointed observation about Rohit's motivation that few others have articulated so clearly: the 50-over World Cup is the one trophy missing from Rohit's cabinet. He led India to the 2023 final only to watch Pat Cummins lift the trophy. He won the 2024 T20 World Cup in Barbados. But the big one — the one that defines a captain's legacy in Indian cricket — remains unclaimed.

"He doesn't have a 50-over World Cup in his kitbag yet," Ashwin said. "I think he wants to go there to the 2027 World Cup and showcase that, and win yet another silverware for himself and for the nation. I think he has also done enough to warrant a place, going all the way till that end."

The numbers support the argument. Rohit's 711 ODI runs since January 2025 at 44.43 aren't godlike, but they're more than respectable for a 39-year-old who has increasingly shouldered the burden of being India's anchor in the powerplay. The real question isn't form — it's whether his body can hold up through a South African campaign that demands peak fitness on fast outfields.

This is the sharpest part of Ashwin's case: South Africa isn't a home World Cup for India. It isn't the subcontinental conditions of 2023 where Kohli averaged 117.66. It's pace, bounce, and fast outfields — conditions where experience and technique matter more than raw power. India's last ICC tournament in South Africa was the 2003 World Cup final, where Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly's big-stage experience was the only reason they got that far.

Ashwin's logic is that in unfamiliar, high-pressure conditions, you want batters who have been there before. Kohli has 891 runs at 68.53 in ODIs since 2025. That's not a man in decline — that's a man averaging higher in his late thirties than most batters do at their peak. You don't discard that because he tweaked a hamstring in a final where he stayed on to score an unbeaten 75.

But here's where Ashwin's honesty cuts deepest. He acknowledged what the cheerleaders won't: age isn't a negotiable variable.

"At this age, injuries are par for the course," Ashwin said. "The body is not the same as it was when it was 35 and below; it's not the same when you cross 32 itself."

There it is. The same man who says "pick them" is also saying their bodies are breaking down in ways that are entirely predictable. Kohli's distal semimembranosus tendon tear is rare — but hamstring problems for a 37-year-old fast runner aren't rare at all. Rohit cleared his fitness test this week, but the fact that he needed to go through a BCCI Centre of Excellence assessment at all tells you where the conversation has moved.

Ashwin's prescription is simple: build a rehabilitation programme around them, manage their workloads intelligently, and — crucially — make them feel wanted. That last part is the one the BCCI historically struggles with. Indian cricket's power structures don't do subtlety well. The moment a selector makes a public comment about "looking to the future," the contract between veteran and system starts to fray.

Ashwin said the smart thing. The courageous thing, even. But the question he sidestepped is the one that will define India's World Cup cycle: what happens when one of them breaks down mid-tournament?

India's squad for the Afghanistan ODIs tells the story in miniature. Kohli: out, hamstring. Pandya: out, quadriceps. Bumrah: rested. That's three of India's four most important white-ball players unavailable for the same series. If this happens in October 2027 in Johannesburg, there's no Yashasvi Jaiswal parachute. There's no convenient bilateral series to skip.

The marriage metaphor is apt, though not in the way Ashwin intended. Marriages work when both parties accept reality. The reality here is that Kohli and Rohit, at their best, make India the favourites for any tournament they enter. But "at their best" now comes with an asterisk, and the asterisk is their health. India's real decision isn't whether to pick them — it's whether to build a squad that can absorb the shock when one or both are suddenly unavailable.

Ashwin sees no reason they shouldn't be there. He's probably right. The harder question is what India does when they're not.