An abundance of riches could prove to be a double-edged sword as the Indian team management has already realised in the run-up to the Asia Cup.
If picking the XV was an arduous task, putting together the ideal playing XI, which will help them plan for the T20 World Cup in five months’ time, is not easy either. Who will play the finisher’s role to perfection? Who will bowl alongside Jasprit Bumrah at the death?
Sunil Gavaskar thinks the continental showdown will help find answers to such posers.
“Who can be the finisher for them… That is something at the moment they are not very certain about… And I say it because they have got so many options. They have got Rinku Singh as a finisher. They have got Shivam Dube as a finisher. Hardik Pandya can play the role of a finisher. Tilak Varma can also play that role. So they will have to zero in on about two or three of them for the World Cup,” the former captain said during an interaction.
“Then I think the death bowling, the last four overs, obviously Bumrah will bowl two of them. But who is going to be bowling those other two? That is an area that they will be looking to get some idea from this tournament. Those are the two areas that they have to really sharpen up on.
Gavaskar prefers Abhishek Sharma and Shubman Gill as openers with Sanju Samson coming down the order. “India has got a very, very good team in this tournament. They have got match-winners right from top to bottom. At the top of the order, somebody like Abhishek and Shubman could be the game changers with their batting. Then, if they get the overs to bat, if the openers give them enough overs to bat, then you could have Suryakumar Yadav and Tilak Varma, as well as Sanju, also being the game changers,” he said.
“Hardik Pandya will make an impact at 6 or 7, and Jasprit Bumrah with his bowling would be the ones to watch out for. Kuldeep Yadav with his wrist spin… So like I said, India has got really champion players from numbers 1 to 14. And I would be very surprised if India don’t win all the matches comfortably.”
He didn’t hesitate to pass his judgement on the controversial workload management issue.
“Workload is something that the player himself has to look at. The way I look at it is very simple, that when you are playing for India, you should be giving it everything and you should not be thinking about anything other than the honour and the privilege of playing for India, ” he said.
But would it have been prudent to rest someone like Bumrah for the Asia Cup, keeping in mind the home Test series against West Indies and South Africa?
“I don’t think a four-over spell is going to have too much of an effect on Bumrah. Because he will not be bowling four overs at a stretch. He will be bowling maybe two overs and one over in the middle and then another over. Or maybe three overs at the start and maybe one over towards the end.
“So I don’t think that should be a worry as far as the workload is concerned. India’s matches are spaced out as well. They are not playing back-to-back. There is nothing to worry about as far as workload for Bumrah is concerned.”
Gavaskar supported the decision to bring Gill back into the T20I side.
“He has been very successful in the T20 format in the IPL, so there is no question that he has the capability of doing well in the format. In the kind of form that he is in, where he has scored more than 750 runs in the just-concluded Test series in England, that really augurs well even for the T20 tournament. Clearly, having him back in the team was a no-brainer.”
While the talk is about playing Samson ahead of Jitesh Sharma as a finisher, Gavaskar thinks he could fit well at No.3 too.
“…they might even be thinking in terms of having Sanju at No. 3 and having Tilak as a finisher at 5 or 6. This is what I think is likely to happen. Because Hardik is in your team as well. So Hardik will probably be batting 5 or 6 again… And Axar (Patel) is also likely to play in this side as a left-hander… Somebody like Rinku and Shivam might have to wait a bit.”
The legendary opener is not reading much into Surya’s poor form in T20Is of late and thinks we could be “in for a very interesting time with Surya as the captain as well as the batter”.
“…Surya is the kind of player for whom T20 is a format where he absolutely enjoys playing. He has captained the team before and done it well. He has been pretty unorthodox in his captaincy as well. So we could be in for a really interesting time in this Asia Cup, with his bowling changes, for example.
“Some of the bowling changes that he made in Sri Lanka, having himself bowl a bit as well as having Rinku come in and bowl… He made use of himself as well as Rinku very very cleverly.”