Can Rishabh Pant Play In Place Of KL Rahul Against South Africa As Opener? Batting Coach Answers

Right-handed batter and current Team India vice-captain KL Rahul has been out of form in the ongoing T20 World Cup as he has recorded scores of 4 and 9 against Pakistan and Netherlands. Rahul has found going tough at the top of the order and he has not been able to rotate strike freely as well. There have been calls for trying out Rishabh Pant at the top of the order, considering is currently warming the bench as Dinesh Karthik is being preferred ahead of him as the wicketkeeper.

India batting coach Vikram Rathour addressed a press conference on Saturday ahead of the game against South Africa, and he was asked whether Rishabh Pant can be tried out as an opener instead of KL Rahul.

Replying to the question, Rathour said: "No, we're not really thinking that. Two games, I don't think that's a good enough sample size anyways. He's been batting really well and he's batted really well in the practice games, also, so we're not looking at any such thing at the moment."

Talking about India's new attacking approach in T20Is, Rathour said: "We are looking to adapt. Of course, playing with intent is always the goal. We are looking to score runs whenever we can. But then we need to keep in account the conditions that we are playing on, the surfaces we are playing on."

"I don't think these are 200, 200-plus wickets, so we'll need to adapt, and I think we have done pretty well in that regard so far," he added.

Virat Kohli has been in good touch in the ongoing T20 World Cup as he has registered scores of 82* and 62* against Pakistan and Netherlands.

Talking about Virat, the batting coach said: "I think the conditions demanded him or the situation demanded him to play in a certain way, and he's done that. He's a good enough player to change his game or adapt his game to whatever the team requires, and he's done that brilliantly so far, and we know that he'll carry on doing that."

Team India are currently at the top of Group 2 in the Super 12 stage with 4 points from 2 games.

Topics mentioned in this article

India Cricket Team South Africa Cricket Team Rishabh Pant KL Rahul ICC T20 World Cup 2022 Cricket Virat Kohli Rohit Sharma