India has a major issue in the upcoming World Cup as Rishabh Pant is most likely going to be out of the quadrennial extravaganza due to the recovery span from his accident. Even though he may make himself available in the dying embers, yet there are also a lot of talks about how things should turn out for India particularly after a decade of embarrassment in the ICC events.
Former Australian captain and Delhi Capitals coach, Ricky Ponting had his fair say about proceedings in the Indian echelons and Punter believes that ideally India should go for a left-hander in place of a left-hander as a combination of the right and left can change the game for the Indians.
Here is what Ricky Ponting had to say about India’s middle-order
In the latest episode of the ICC Review, Ponting said, “Look, I do think they’ll stick with him. I think in their World Cup squad, KL will definitely be there. I think Ishan Kishan should definitely be there as well to give another left-handed batting option because if you look back to game three, they promoted Axar and Jadeja ahead of Surya because of Ashton Agar and the balls spinning away from the right-handers.”
He further added on the topic, “With Rishabh not being there now, they might think of maybe wanting to play a specialist left-handed batter in the middle order which I think would have to be Ishan Kishan in some role, whether that’s at No.4 or No.5.”
This is what Ricky Ponting believes about left-handers
The Australian legend continued, “Just to negate teams that have got left-arm off-spin because when you look at the spinners around the world now, there are very few right-arm off-spinners in ODIs and T20Is.”
Ricky Ponting also added, “You need to have left-handers through your middle order. Most sides will have left-arm off-spin and right-arm leg spin and if you’ve only got right-handers through the middle order, it’s a lot harder for those guys to play it.” He finally concluded by saying, “So I think they’ll go into that World Cup with the two keepers in their squad and they’ll make the decision on what they need as far as their batting is concerned.”
