Indian captain Rohit Sharma believes that talks of ODI cricket losing its appeal are nonsense

Cricket fans and experts across the globe believe that the constantly growing cycle of franchise leagues and multiple T20Is owing to the popularity of the shortest format of the sport is actually becoming detrimental to One Day Internationals. As T20I has become the face of cricket, it is slowly taking up a larger and larger chunk of the viewership interest and as a result, more matches are being played in the 20-over format than ever.

While it poses a threat to the longer formats of the game, the opinion is that the sanctity of Test cricket for being the purest format of the sport, as well as a recent upsurge in interest due to various reasons, will remain unaffected. ODI cricket, however, may have to pay the price.

The mushrooming of T20 leagues around the world is also leading to a packed calendar in an era of already oversaturated cricket calendars. As a result, players are more mindful than ever on what formats and competitions they choose to play as was evident with both Ben Stokes and Trent Boult taking hard calls on their future.

Several former legends of the game like Ravi Shastri and Shahid Afridi already feel that One Day cricket has become quite boring these days and reducing it down to 30 or 40 overs may be the way to spice things up going forward.

However, when Indian captain Rohit Sharma was asked about his opinion on the same matter, he rubbished these claims that the perception of ODI cricket is in danger of losing its appeal to fans. “Mera naam hi one-day cricket se bana hai. Sab bekar ki baatein hai (I made my name from one-day cricket. These talks are nonsense). People were earlier talking about Test cricket (being in danger),” Rohit told reporters.

He went on to add that cricket is important to him, be it any format. While it remains an individual choice for most professionals on which they format they want to persist with and which format they are likely to sacrifice in order to prolong their careers, the Indian skipper said all three formats are extremely important to him.