Dhawan has made his comeback in India squad for Sri Lanka T20Is.
Team India will start the decade with three T20I matches against Sri Lanka with the first match to be played at the Barsapara Stadium in Guwahati. Since it is the year that the T20 World Cup will take place, every single T20I match is important in its own right as it helps teams reach their championship goals. Unlike in other formats, India hasn’t been as dominant in T20s. One of the reasons for that is due to their approach to the top order.
While the tactic has worked for ODIs, it has done the opposite for the shortest format of the game. While they rely on finesse, their opponents rely on brute strength to score many runs as quickly as possible. One more possible problem to India’s poor performance in T20s is Shikhar Dhawan’s approach. And, according to Kris Srikkanth, KL Rahul should replace him.
Looking back on 2018, Dhawan finished the year as the leading run-scorer. Since then, he hasn’t been able to replicate his success in T20Is. This past year alone, he played in just 13 T20Is, scoring 272 runs at an average of 22.66 and un unimpressive strike-rate of 110.56. While Dhawan has been struggling, Rahul has been performing very well. As a matter of fact, he could be on the of top 3 T20 batters for India.
Srikkanth also said that if it were up to him, he wouldn’t have selected Shikhar Dhawan to be part of the T20I squad for the World Cup. ‘Runs against SL don’t count. If I was chairman of selectors, I won’t pick Dhawan in the T20 WC squad. There is no competition between him and Rahul. Only one winner’.
Time and time again, KL Rahul has proved that he can perform in the shortest format as well as in any other format. To prove this, he scored two half-centuries and just came up short from scoring a century in the recently concluded series against the West Indies. In nine T20I innings in 2019, Rahul scored 356 runs at an average of 44.50 and a strike-rate of 142.50.
With this kind of consistent performance, it’s a no-brainer to always have him on the team. However, Rahul is only a replacement for Shikhar Dhawan who made his return in the Sri Lanka series. With Rohit Sharma being rested, both Dhawan and Rahul open for the team with the former being given another chance to prove his worth.
T20s are the shortest format in the game of cricket with a single game lasting just 20 overs or 120 ‘legal’ deliveries. To find out more about T20s and other cricket formats, visit Betwala’s page.
READ MORE: A Beginner's Guide on How to Play Cricket
