Ahead of India’s Asia Cup’s first match against the UAE, Indian bowling coach Morne Morkel said that the decision on the number of spinners for the game will be taken after the wicket is seen as well. He also opined on how great spinner Kuldeep Yadav has been, attitude-wise, despite getting no chances during the Test tour of England.
Speaking during the pre-tournament press conference, Morkel said, “We need to go and look at the wicket. I think when the Champions Trophy was played at that time, there was a lot of cricket on the surfaces here and they looked a little bit tired. So again, tonight we will have a first look at the surface and I believe there is quite a bit of grass covering on the square. So we will have a good idea going into the first game in terms of what is sort of a better way to go, but in terms of planning at the moment, we’re covering all bases, and then we will make a decision on match day.”
Speaking about Kuldeep Yadav, who bowled 32 overs in Central Zone’s Duleep Trophy quarterfinal but couldn’t take any wickets and also missed out on playing chances in England as spin bowling all-rounders Ravindra Jadeja and Washington Sundar played ahead of him.
“I think he is a very professional athlete. His attitude since England, where he received hardly any game time, has been excellent—he is still the guy who puts the overs in. And for me, Kuldeep, like I said, has bowled a lot of overs in his career. He knows what to do to get himself ready for T20 cricket, white-ball cricket. And like I said, we can control only what we can control now, and that is when we train and have our sessions, that it is focused, that there is a purpose behind it, and we have goals. We set those goals out and from there, it is up to them to go out and lead with the ball,” Morne Morkel concluded.
Team India squad for Asia Cup: Surya Kumar Yadav (C), Shubman Gill (VC), Abhishek Sharma, Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Jitesh Sharma (WK), Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh, Varun Chakravarthy, Kuldeep Yadav, Sanju Samson (WK), Harshit Rana, Rinku Singh.
Reserve players: Prasidh Krishna, Washington Sundar, Riyan Parag, Dhruv Jurel, Yashasvi Jaiswal.
