Former India batting great Gautam Gambhir© AFP
For India opening batter Gautam Gambhir, who played a crucial role in the team’s victory in the first ever T20 World Cup in 2007, has picked his ideal playing XI for the Indian team, which will start its 2022 T20 World Cup campaign on Sunday against Pakistan. Making some keen observations, Gambhir picked Mohammed Shami as India’s lead paceman over Bhuvneshwar Kumar and also said that he would play Rishabh Pant over Dinesh Karthik.
“India should play 3 pacers. In my view, Shami should play in place of Bhuvneshwar. Arshdeep and Harshal Patel being the two other pacers. Yuzvendra Chahal and Axar Patel as two spinners. Hardik Pandya as fourth seamer….Shami is good with the ball both at the start and in death. He bowled really well at the death in warm-up match vs Australia,” Gambhir told Zee News.
He further explained why he thought playing Rishabh Pant over Dinesh Karthik was more important for the team but added that Karthik will get the nod over Pant.
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“You don’t pick a batter to play just 10 balls. You pick a batter who can bat for long and Karthik has not been given that role or he has not shown the same intentions himself. He only comes to play 3 or 4 overs in the death. But what if India loses a couple of quick wickets? That is when you need Pant as you don’t want to expose Hardik so early,” said Gambhir
India were eliminated in the Super12 stage of the ICC T20 World Cup last year and would want to make it to the semifinals this time around.
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