Ravi Shastri wants T20 World Cup to be played in Round Robin format and not in group format

The previous Indian head coach Ravi Shastri believes the reason why India could not qualify for the playoff round of the T20 World Cup in the UAE was that they were “timid” in the second match against New Zealand. Shastri admitted that Pakistan’s performance was better than India in the first game and that can happen at times, but in the second game, India’s approach was wrong.

According to Shastri, India should have gone for the “jugular” when they took on the Kiwis in the must-win game, but the way they batted after losing the toss, it was very tentative and playing like that in a pressure game doesn’t work.

Every team should play every team in T20 World Cup: Ravi Shastri

Ravi Shastri, however, is not happy with the current format of the T20 World Cup. Speaking on Star Sports, Shastri said while deciding the World Cup, a playoff round after a Round Robin league makes more sense than classifying the teams into two groups and having the top 2 from both groups in the semifinal.

In Shastri’s view, Round Robin format is the “way to go” in the future editions of the T20 World Cup. However, it doesn’t seem to be possible because ICC is planning to increase the number of teams in the T20 World Cup going forward and in case of more teams, the tournament can only be played in the group format.

The ODI World Cup 2019 was played in the Round Robin format and India had managed to qualify for the semifinal with ease, winning all their completed games barring the game against England where they couldn’t chase down the target of more than 350.

After losing the game against New Zealand in the T20 World Cup 2021, India won three back to back games against Afghanistan, Scotland and Namibia, but the first two losses eliminated them from the tournament, as New Zealand and Pakistan won 4 and 5 games respectively in the group round and qualified for the semifinal.