Will Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma retire soon after India’s ODI series against Australia? The three-match series, starting on October 19, will be Kohli and Rohit’s first international assignment since the Champions Trophy 2025. The two players have already retired from T20Is and Tests. With the next big ODI tournament – the 2027 World Cup – being almost two years away, there are question marks on whether Kohli and Rohit will be persisted with.

Ravichandran Ashwin, who has played for a long time with the star duo, says Kohli and Rohit are at the back-end of their careers.

“On one side is selection, on the other side is Kohli and Rohit. These are two sides of the same coin. The selection and selectors have clearly shown that the team had decided to move forward. However, in this process, there are two players who are at the back end of their careers. You like it or not, they are at the back-end of their careers. However, one thing I would like to say, the way to deal with players at the back-end of their careers should be better.

It is very easy to say from fans’ perspective, from an organisation’s perspective that they have grown old and should retire,” Ashwin said on his YouTube channel.

“One of the reasons we feel this way is that we see many young players in the IPL performing well, and we believe they can replace these experienced players. However, during this process, one thing we often overlook is solid communication and knowledge transfer. I request that this be addressed in the future.”

Ashwin opined that the communication with Rohit and Kohli should have started right after the 2024 T20 World Cup.

“I really hope the conversation has happened with Virat and Rohit. But if the conversation has happened now, why did it not happen after they said they were retiring after the 2024 T20 World Cup? It could have happened then itself. Had it happened back then, they could have thought about whether to continue playing or not, because this is the direction the team is wishing to head towards,” Ashwin said.

“But now, this current situation leaves a lot of uninformed space.

When there is uninformed decision-making that is put outside, you leave a lot of room for speculation. Why is the communication not coming from the players? Because there is not much communication happening, it is not going from here to there. If the communication is not clean, transparent, and not done with the vision moving forward, it leaves the players in a very tender space. Considering the magnitude of Virat and Rohit’s contribution to Indian cricket, I think there should be better communication not only to them, but to everyone else.”