Every cricketer’s dream is to represent his or her country in the prestigious World Cup tournament. While many are fortunate to have the opportunity to represent their country on the grandest stage, there are many who, despite giving their all, are unable to compete in World Cup tournaments.
Because only 15 cricketers can make the World Cup squad, there are some legends who have never played in a World Cup.
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Alastair Cook
Alastair Cook made his International Test debut for England with an incredible century against India in Nagpur. Despite the fact that he is regarded as one of the greatest players to have played the longest format of the game, he was unable to maintain his skills in the ODI format. He appeared in 92 One-Day Internationals and scored 3204 runs at an average of 36.40. He was even named the team’s skipper for the ODI format, but he was fired just months before the ICC 2015 Cricket World Cup. He couldn’t make an appearance on such a grand stage after the tournament.
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VVS Laxman
Laxman requires no introduction. For over 16 years, the great lower-middle order batsman played tests for India alongside other great cricketers such as Sachin, Ganguly, and Dravid. He was technically superior to most of his contemporaries. And on his day, he could outscore most batsmen in the Indian team. But because he couldn’t do it very often and had an ODI average of only 30, he was never selected for a World Cup squad.
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Justin Langer
Many fans and pundits consider Langer to be one of the greatest Test openers of all time. Langer and Mathew Hayden were one of the most feared opening pairs in cricket history, but Gilchrist opened the innings with Hayden in ODIs. While Langer’s statistics in Tests are impressive, his record in ODIs is dismal. Because there was a lot of competition in the Australian batting order, he only got to play eight ODIs and never got to play in a World Cup.
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Ishant Sharma
Ishant Sharma, a pacer for Team India, made his international debut in 2007. He is currently one of India’s most experienced players. During his illustrious career as a member of Team India, he has seen his fair share of ups and downs. With his skill and accuracy, he has established himself as a key player in the game’s longest format. Despite being an asset to Team India in the longer format, he has yet to secure a place in India’s ODI squad. One of the reasons he has yet to play in a World Cup is because of this.
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Murali Kartik
Murali Kartik, along with Harbhajan Singh and Anil Kumble, was one of the best spinners of his era. However, it is widely acknowledged that his status as a left-arm spinner helped him very little during Sourav Ganguly’s captaincy. Ganguly didn’t have much faith in him. Furthermore, when India played abroad, the team always went with one spinner, and Harbhajan Singh always delivered match-winning performances back then.
