IND vs NZ: Sanjay Manjrekar comes up with a bold statement for Indian team after ODI series loss

The Indian team recently suffered a 1-2 defeat in the ODI series against New Zealand, which led to considerable criticism of their performance. However, former Indian cricketer Sanjay Manjrekar has come out in support of the team. He believes that India's recent ODI series loss against New Zealand shouldn't be taken too seriously. He stated that in the current scenario, only the World Cup matters in ODI cricket. According to him, even winning the Champions Trophy is no longer considered very significant. 

"Honestly, in 50-over cricket today, what really matters are the World Cups and not even the Champions Trophy. Because if you try and remember the last three Champions Trophy winners, you'll struggle to remember those. But the 50-over World Cup, you'll remember each winner from the time the World Cup started. So, yes, if you want to have your setbacks and poor performances, get it out of the system now," shared Manjrekar on Instagram.

Sanjay Manjrekar believes that bilateral series should only be viewed as warm-up matches before major events. India lost the recently held ODIseries against a Kiwi team that was playing without several experienced players. 

"You've qualified for the World Cup so these bilateral series are scheduled but they're mostly warm-up games and one shouldn't read too much into it. In fact, the importance of these bilateral series has become such that two weeks later, no cricket fan also remembers the result of what happened in that bilateral ODI series. It's all about the World Cups and form coming into the World Cup is really not a big indicator of who's going to win the World Cup," he added.

The Indian team will now play a five-match T20I series against New Zealand, starting on January 21. This will be the last series before the T20 World Cup, which begins next month, and both teams will be looking to finalise their combinations. India will then co-host the T20 World Cup 2026 with Sri Lanka in February and March, entering the tournament as the defending champions. The India vs New Zealand first T20I will be held at Nagpur. The Indian team will enter without its star batter Tilak Varma. Tilak will miss the first three T20Is due to injury. Shreyas Iyer has been included instead of him for the T20I series. Apart from Tilak, Washington Sundar also missed out on the series. Ravi Bishnoi is included in the squad.