What Ajinkya Rahane can learn from Faf du Plessis' style of play

Ajinkya Rahane in action

In the media conference, prior to the first ODI against South Africa, limited-overs skipper MS Dhoni had this to say about Ajinkya Rahane:

“So it is tough for him as of now. If am looking for someone to bat five or six I don’t think he is the person. His strength is top of the order. If given a chance, we will try to feature him in the top three, if not then we would find it tough to place him in the playing eleven.”

True to his word, the 27-year-old walked into bat at the fall of Shikhar Dhawan’s wicket on Sunday at the Green Park in Kanpur with India chasing 303 for a victory.

Now one of the things that we saw in the 1st ODI in Bangladesh, which India lost, was that it took Rahane time to settle down and with the team chasing a sizeable total on that occasion as well; and because of that, the run-rate kept escalating.

But his start in Kanpur was a sharp contrast to Fatullah. Rahane began by scoring 8 runs in his 1st 10 balls but managed 4 in the next 10. A combined tally of 14 came in the next 20.

Cumulative: 26 runs  Strike Rate: 65.

Not bad you would say, considering you had a Rohit Sharma at the other end, who was batting sumptuously.

But what became the issue was his scoring rate in his next 40 balls. Between balls 41-50, he scored 8 runs, 51-60, 10 runs, 61-70 balls, 8 runs and the final 10 balls of his innings yielded just 8 runs.

Cumulative: 34 runs  Strike Rate: 85.

While the Strike Rate is good, the fact that he couldn't quite complement Rohit in getting boundaries on a consistent basis didn't help the team’s pursuit of the runs and he eventually fell for 60 off 82 balls and India in the end fell short by 5 runs.

Can he take a cue from the opposition?

While there are several players in the history of the 50-over game who have found it hard to accelerate after getting a start, the Mumbaikar can perhaps have a look at a player in the touring South African line-up itself to improve his batting- Faf du Plessis.

Let's consider the same match at Kanpur:

After Quinton de Kock had fallen inside the 1st 10 overs thanks to a peach from Ravichandran Ashwin, du Plessis walked in to join Hashim Amla in the middle.

Here’s his run-scoring split:

The opening 10 balls: 1 run

11-20- 17 runs

21-30-5 runs

31-40-8 runs

Cumulative: 31 runs in 40 balls Strike Rate: 77.5

Now in comparison to Rahane, the numbers are pretty similar but the big difference is the clearly between the 11-20 range. How Faf didn't allow the pressure to strangle him altogether and managed to get his inning back on track, by scoring boundaries.

Now lets see the remaining portions of his innings:

41-50: 3 runs

51-60: 17 runs

61-70: 6 runs

71-77:5 runs

Cumulative: 31 runs Strike Rate: 77.5

Once again, just like the 1st block of 40 balls, du Plessis found it hard between the 41st and 50th deliveries but managed to counter it by scoring 17 runs in his next 10 balls.He was eventually out for 62 off 77 balls.

What Rahane can inculcate from Faf’s batting

1.Use your defense more productively

Now in terms of who is the more technically equipped, there is no doubt that Rahane is a lot more correct than du Plessis. But what the latter does very smartly is that instead of prodding the ball always, he looks to extend his defense a bit, go a bit inside out and look to place the ball in the gaps for runs.

Rahane though looks for the inside out shot only when he needs a boundary and while that isn't a bad option, it would also serve him well if he looks to get runs off his defense by looking to extend it further to knock it for a run rather than prodding at it.

Faf du Plessis has a very good ability to make room and play the cut

2.Use your abilities in a better way

One of du Plessis's big strengths is the way in which he creates room and plays the ball through the point region.We saw that shot in his short stay a lot at Indore as well.

Rahane. on the other hand, is a very good player off the back foot and can hook and pull well, But with the lack of bounce on Indian pitches, those shots wouldn't come off much use so he should ideally should look to make maximum use of his other 2 strong points.

3.Go inside out a lot more and look to pace at regular intervals

4.Go straight over the bowler’s head.

There is no doubt that Rahane has a lot of time at his disposal but if he pursues any ambitions of  becoming an efficient played in coloured clothing fr India, he needs to make some adjustments to his game sooner or later.