The chief of the Indian selection committee, MSK Prasad reckons that Rishabh Pant, who is expected to board the flight with the Indian team for England where World Cup 2019 will be played is a “champion cricketer in the making” for his ability to seamlessly switch formats.
After being “rested” for the ODI series against Australia and New Zealand, doubts have been created regarding his place in the England-bound squad but Prasad revealed the selection committee’s plans about talents such as Pant and Shubman Gill.
In his recent interview with PTI, Prasad said, “Rishabh Pant played three T20s and four Test matches in Australia and that had an impact on his body. He needed complete rest for two weeks and then we will take a call on how many matches he will play against England Lions. Let me put it straight, he is very much in our World Cup plans. He is a champion player in the making and even he is not fully aware of the kind of potential he has.”
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Prasad is happy that Pant now understands what skipper Virat Kohli and coach Ravi Shastri expect of him and his knock in the Sydney Test was a testimony to the same.
The chief selector said, “Ravi and Virat had advised him to put his head down and respect the match situation and he did exactly that. He proved that he can switch gears seamlessly. When we picked him for Tests, experts were skeptical about his keeping but 11 catches in a Test in England, record dismissals in Australia series proves that the selection committee is vindicated.”
Prasad is also looking forward to the international debut of the young Shubman Gill as he feels that the enormously talented Punjab batsman is now ready for international cricket. In just over a year, Gill has made massive strides in his career, so much so that now he has been included in the Indian squad. Having made his First Class debut only in 2017, he represented India in the U-19 World Cup in 2018 and now sees himself sharing the dressing room with the likes of Kohli and MS Dhoni.
The head of the selection committee said, “Shubman is comfortable both opening the innings as well as playing in the middle-order. For New Zealand series, we are looking at him as the reserve opener behind Shikhar (Dhawan) and Rohit (Sharma). I won’t comment if he will make it to World Cup but he was phenomenal as an opener for India A in New Zealand. We have discussed with Rahul (Dravid), that Shubman is ready for international cricket.”
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Other youngsters like Hanuma Vihari, Mayank Agarwal, Prithvi Shaw, Khaleel Ahmed have all been impressive in international cricket and that makes Prasad very happy. For him and his panel, one of the biggest plus positives have been taking the risk of unleashing two wrist spinners in Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal in the ODI set-up, replacing veterans like Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja.
Prasad said, “We received flak when we had replaced world’s No 1 and 2 spinners (as per ICC Rankings) with two young wrist spinners. One and half years down the line, they (Kuldeep and Chahal) have had a contribution in at least 70 percent of India’s limited-overs wins.”
On Sunday, Gill along with Tamil Nadu all-rounder Vijay Shankar was chosen as replacements for KL Rahul and Hardik Pandya for the Australia and New Zealand series, owing to the suspension till further action for the latter duo.
