When Unmukt Chand featured in a PEPSI ad alongside MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina

Unmukt Chand, India’s 2012 U19 World Cup-winning captain, won’t have the chance of donning the national jersey after he retired from Indian cricket to give his career a new lease of life. The 28-year-old has signed a three-year deal with the United States’ Major League Cricket (MLC), effectively bringing the curtains down on his career for Team India.

Chand will be joining his former U19 teammates- Smit Patel and Harmeet Singh- in the USA. Back in 2012, he scored an unbeaten 111 in the final of the U19 World Cup against Australia in Townsville. However, his career couldn’t quite flourish from thereon.

Apart from taking his team through to glory, Chand also got the privilege of featuring in an advertisement along with MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina. The PEPSI advertisement came out after Chand’s heroics in the WC in Australia.

It was a very painful call, says Unmukt Chand 

After winning the WC, Chand led India’s A team as well for quite some time but lost his place in 2016. Even for Delhi, he failed to feature as a regular member after which he made a move to Uttarakhand. For the 2020-21 season, he moved back to Delhi only to warm the benches.

On his decision to move to the USA, Chand said that it was a ‘painful call’, but he also talked about turning his career around after a tough phase.

“It’s a tough one for someone like me, who has always dreamed of playing for the country. And most of it very emotional one as well and obviously, having played every other cricket, except for the senior team, I think it was a very painful call,” Chand was quoted as saying to Cricbuzz.

“But then the last few years have not been very kind to me in terms of facing a lot of association politics among other things. I’ve not been able to play a lot of cricket because of such things and that is why I arrived at this decision, to play some good cricket here in the US. I’d finally like to thank the BCCI for their support over the years in making me the cricketer I am today,” he added.