3 Players who could have been considered ahead of Mayank Agarwal
With six wins in eight matches, the Indian team has cemented their semi-final spot in the ongoing 2019 cricket world cup. The Men in Blue have played smart cricket and have been tremendous in the pressure situations.
The usual suspects - Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma have been the backbone of the team. Sharma now jointly holds the record for most hundreds in an edition (4) with Kumar Sangakkara who had scored four back to back hundreds in 2015. Kohli has been in good form with 5 fifties in 7 innings. Jasprit Bumrah has been the leader of the bowling attack and has been unplayable at the death. Burmah has found an able partner in Mohammed Shami who has taken 14 wickets in just 4 games.
Players like Hardik Pandya, KL Rahul and Kuldeep Yadav have all had their moments and the blues seem on course for what could be a potential third world cup title. However, Virat Kohli and the team management have been troubled by one thing throughout the tournament - injuries.
Shikhar Dhawan and Vijay Shankar have both been ruled out of the tournament. Bhuvneshwar Kumar missed 2 matches due to a leg injury that he picked up while bowling against Pakistan.
Rishabh Pant, the explosive wicket-keeper batsmen was called in to replace his Delhi Capitals teammate - Shikhar Dhawan. Pant has featured in 2 games thus far with scores of 32 and 48. However, when India announced their replacement for Vijay Shankar, many were left confused. The BCCI named Karnataka opening batsmen Mayank Agarwal as the replacement for Shankar in the UK. Agarwal, an aggressive opener has never featured in an ODI for India. He made his debut in the test series against Australia in Dec-Jan but has never featured in the coloured clothing. Also as Shankar is a middle-order batsman, many Indian batsmen have the right to feel a little hard done by.
Here’s a list of 3 batsmen who could have been picked instead of Agarwal:
#3 Ajinkya Rahane
One of the many players to be tried by the management at number 4 is the Mumbai batsman Ajinkya Rahane. Rahane was given an extended run by MS Dhoni at number 4 and even batted at that position on the 2015 World Cup. He was subsequently dropped because of his inability to rotate the strike in the middle overs and the team management made it clear that he would have to break into the team as an opener.
However, after some good performances at the top of the order, the team management again gave Rahane the cursed number 4 position for the series in South Africa. The Rajasthan Royals batsmen scored 140 runs at an average of 35 in the series and was subsequently dropped from the team. Rahane has not featured for India ever since.
In a tournament like the World Cup, the experience is very important. Rahane with his prior experience of having played in the World Cup would have been a good option. Moreover, he has been in the UK for the past month as he has been playing county cricket for Hampshire and would have been well accustomed to the conditions in the UK.
Also read – World cup most wickets