You must have heard this song from the Bollywood movie ‘Yahan Ke Hum Sikandar…’. And if you have heard, then tell whether this song is not fitting the young players of the Indian team playing in the T20 series against Australia. From what has been seen from Visakhapatnam to Thiruvananthapuram, it seems that these young players are the real Alexander of this game i.e. T20 cricket. Now there is T20 World Cup only next year. In such a situation, the question is whether India should prepare to win the T20 World Cup by keeping the focus on these youth? Shouldn’t Team India look towards Rohit-Virat?
The questions are big and their answers can be many types. For now, it is important to look at the bravery of India’s young players in the same series from where these questions have arisen. First of all, let us know who is this young player who wrote the script of Team India’s victory by proving his mettle against Australia in T20? So there are names like Yashasvi Jaiswal, Ishan Kishan, Rinku Singh, Rituraj Gaikwad. If you look at the strike rates of all of them, you will find them to be less batsmen and more like batsmen, who just come to the crease to swing the bat and crush the bowlers mercilessly.
Team India’s ‘new maestro’, strike rate tells the story
Rinku Singh, who is making his mark as a match finisher, has a strike rate of 230.43 in the 2 matches played so far in the T20 series against Australia. Yashasvi Jaiswal has scored runs at a strike rate of 224.24. Tilak Verma’s strike rate is 158.33. Suryakumar Yadav has scored runs at a strike rate of 190.38. So Ishan Kishan has swung the bat at a strike rate of 154.92.
Now just think, how can batsmen whose strike rate is so bumper be kept away from the T20 format or its World Cup? Anyway, in this shortest format of cricket, the strike rate of the batsman only tells about his aggression. And, these young batsmen of India have the same thing which is visible match after match in the T20 series against Australia.
Should we rely on new players to prepare for the T20 World Cup?
So should Team India start preparing for the T20 World Cup by relying on them again? The kind of form that the young cricketers of India are showing and the consistency that is being seen in their game, there is no harm in doing the same. Meaning, young Indian players have full capability to capitalize on the opportunity. But, then the other side of the coin is that since T20 World Cup is like the Mahabharata of cricket, where experience may also be needed to win the match, then in such a situation Rohit-Virat can be useful, who are the most in T20 International. He is among the players who have scored the most runs in the match and this format.
Veteran cricketers also believe that experience is not the solution.
Many veteran cricketers from India and abroad have also advocated for Rohit-Virat to be played in the T20 World Cup 2024 because they have the experience which can be useful to the team. However, its measure is not only the experience, but also the strike rate of experienced faces like Rohit-Virat in batting, which is not at all less than the young stars performing right now. The career strike rate of both Rohit and Virat is close to 140 in T20 International.
India will win only if we get experience with enthusiasm!
So the simple thing is that the enthusiasm of India is boiling, there is also a dash of experience in it, and if the preparations are implemented on this pattern, then those Indian players who could not do it on their own soil, those are West Indies and America. Will be seen doing it on earth.
