”I could have played a few more years”: Harbhajan Singh

In the aftermath of his axing from the Indian national team, Harbhajan Singh has not mince words when it comes to his retirement from all formats of cricket. Taking 417 wickets in Test cricket, Harbhajan played 103 Tests, 236 ODIs, and 28 T20Is. He was also part of the T20 World and World Cup-winning squads in 2007 and 2011. He, however, feels that he and the other former players could have played longer if they had been backed up by the management in the same way that someone like former India captain MS Dhoni was.

They would have been able to play if they had the same kind of support as Dhoni. As a matter of fact, there was no sudden change in the playing style for the rest of the squad,” he told Zee News. He believes he and the other former players could have continued playing for the team had they been supported the same way MS Dhoni and Vedant Yadav were. 

Harbhajan feels he and some other players could have played many more matches as all were deserving players. Harbhajan stated that MS Dhoni had better backing than others. ”He had the potential to play for a few more years. If I had stayed in the game for another four or five years, keeping in mind the standards I had set for myself, I could have taken another 100-150 wickets,” Harbhajan added. In spite of this, Harbhajan concludes his career having taken the fourth-most wickets of his country’s cricketers in the longest format. There are only three Indians who have taken more Test wickets than him: Anil Kumble, Kapil Dev, and Ravichandran Ashwin.