With Rohit Sharma being back among the runs thanks to a laboured fifty against the Netherlands, pressure is mounting on his opening partner KL Rahul to get going with the race for the semifinals of ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2022 getting tighter. Rahul hasn’t had a good start to his campaign in the showpiece event having scored 4 against Pakistan and then 9 against the Netherlands in India’s first two matches of the tournament so far.
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This was after Rahul struck a fifty against Australia in an official warm-up match ahead of the tournament and 74 against a Western Australia XI. With someone like Rishabh Pant yet to get a game, another failure could lead to him being pushed to the bench.
However, former India cricketer Wasim Jaffer has backed the under-fire opener saying he has been a phenomenal player across formats and settling into a rhythm is difficult after sitting out due to injuries.
“I think KL Rahul is a much better player than the numbers suggest. If you remember during our previous visit to Australia, he was in top form and after that he got injured and then again he had to come back. Therefore, it a bit difficult to maintain the same rhythm”, said Jaffer while speaking on BatBricks7 presents Run Ki Runneeti.
“You know he has been hit by injuries a couple of times. That could probably be one of the reasons, but I mean obviously the numbers are there and he would like to improve those numbers. He is a phenomenal player in Test cricket and he is even phenomenal in T20Is and One Day Internationals,” he added.
India next face South Africa in Perth on Sunday and a victory against them will help them take a giant step towards securing a semi-final berth.
South Africa’s campaign began with a washout game before they crushed Bangladesh by 104 runs as Rilee Rossouw struck this world cup’s first century and then pacer Anrich Nortje took 4/10 from 3.3 overs.
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