There's no need to play in overseas leagues: Ravi Shastri and Zaheer Khan back Rahul Dravid’s stance

Ever since India crashed out of the T20 World Cup, there have been plenty of voices about why the Indians should be playing overseas T20 leagues that would expose them to a variety of challenging conditions, enhancing their flair away from home.

However, Indian coach, Rahul Dravid was strictly against the same as he said that playing foreign leagues can very well impact the entire cricketing structure for the Men in Blue as it isn’t just T20I cricket that Rohit and company proliferate in but they are the stalwarts of every single format of the game.

Ravi Shastri and Zaheer Khan have come out in Rahul Dravid’s support, echoing his sentiments and expressing their opinion about why Indian cricketers shouldn’t be thinking about joining overseas franchise tournaments.

Talking in an interaction on Amazon Prime Video, Zaheer said, “I feel there are a lot of processes in place. It's not about playing only franchise cricket, it's about going to different countries to learn things. That is something which is important, and you've seen with the BCCI, with their shadow tours, I think those processes are well in place.”

He further added, “I don't see any other reason right now for players to go and play in a particular tournament. What you have domestically right now is also a robust structure. So why depend on others? We have more than enough means for producing good players. And you look at our bench strength as well, you can virtually play three line-ups, and they will be able to compete at any level."

Ravi Shastri was of a similar opinion, adding, “There is enough domestic cricket for all these players to get absorbed in the system and get an opportunity. Plus, you get these India A tours, you get a lot of these other tours, where at one given time you might have two Indian teams playing in the future, where the opportunity will come for the other lot to go somewhere else whilst India is in another country - to go play and see what you know they can do.”

“So there's no need [to play in overseas leagues], they're absolutely fine playing IPL cricket and focusing on domestic cricket. We need them to play domestic cricket in India as well,” concluded Shastri.