The players on standby are Mohammed Shami, Ravi Bishnoi, Deepak Chahar and Shreyas Iyer. (AP / File)After the all-India senior selection committee recently announced the squad which will travel to Australia for the upcoming ICC T20 Men’s World Cup, former chairman of the selection committee Krishnamachari Srikkanth and former India seamer and T20 World Cup Winner Irfan Pathan shared their insights on India’s possible playing XI for the multi-nation tournament.
While Jasprit Bumrah and Harshal Patel have made their return to the squad and Ravichandran Ashwin, Yuzvendra Chahal and Axar Patel will lead the spin department. The players on standby are Mohammed Shami, Ravi Bishnoi, Deepak Chahar and Shreyas Iyer.
“My playing 11, wherever you play, whether you’re playing in Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney or Perth, my playing 11 is always fixed. For the first game – KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli – number three, Suryakumar Yadav – number four, number five is Hardik Pandya, number six is Rishabh Pant, number seven – Ashwin, eight – Chahal, 9, 10, 11 – in this particular team will be Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, (Jasprit) Bumrah and of course Harshal Patel,” said Srikkanth.
Irfan Pathan had a slightly different outlook on who should start in the playing XI. “In my opinion, if you’re playing the first match, you need to have some experienced bowlers including one spinner. So, from the top, my playing 11 would be – Rohit, KL Rahul, number three – Virat (Kohli), number four – Suryakumar Yadav, number five – Deepak Hooda, number six – Hardik Pandya, number seven – Dinesh Karthik, number eight will be a right arm leg spinner so it would be (Yuzvendra) Chahal, 9 to 11, here there will be Jasprit Bumrah, Harshal Patel and along with that you can go for Bhuvaneshwar Kumar.”
“So, there will be a combination here, three fast bowlers out of which two are quality fast bowlers, who will be able to bowl at the death as well. And I will make sure that I have the combination and the liberty to choose from the three fast bowlers, even Arshdeep (Singh) to handle the death bowling So, in my opinion, in the playing 11, the spinner is clear, it’s just whether I can make space for Arshdeep in the team,” he added.
With the marquee tournament just over a month away, preparations for the tournament are already in motion as India take on Australia in a 3-match T20I series starting on September 20 followed by 3 T20Is and 3 ODI’s versus South Africa on September 28.