Indian team’s hopes of creating a new record of successive T20I wins were dashed on Thursday night with South Africa chasing down a mammoth 212 in Delhi for a seven-wicket win and thus ending India’s winning streak at 12 – the joint most in T20I history.
Indian bowlers did have an off-day and a couple of dropped catches didn’t help their cause either. However, questions are being raised on the tactics used by stand-in captain Rishabh Pant in not utilising legspinner Yuzvendra Chahal’s full quota of four overs.
Chahal, the purple cap winner of IPL 2022, bowled just 13 deliveries and leaked 26 runs but former India pacer Zaheer Khan thinks that the legspinner is an attacking bowler who has the ability to come back and break partnerships even though he’s going for runs.
Speaking on cricbuzzZaheer said in the past Chahal has shown that he might be having an off-day but he has the knack of taking wickets and Pant would do well to revisit his calls during the series opening T20I played at the Arun Jaitley Stadium.
“Not using Yuzvendra Chahal’s full quota of four overs is something Rishabh Pant will look at in the hindsight and team management will have conversations around. Because we have seen Chahal do that – he’s having a tough day but having that ability to come back and take wickets. And what Indian team required to win this game was to bring the next batter in. So the call was in your hand,” Zaheer said.
Zaheer said the fact that left-arm spinner Axar Patel went for 19 runs in his final over probably let Pant make the call that bowling with slow bowlers wouldn’t be the best option and so he didn’t bring back Chahal for another spell.
“May be in the hindsight Rishabh Pant will definitely try and analyse the game and see what he could have done differently. Maybe Axar’s over went for runs could have given him the signal that maybe spin is not the right option now. Ability of Chahal is greater than that. He could have created opportunity – he can go for runs but can give you wickets. The game would have been different,” he said.
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