Former India opener Wasim Jaffer hailed wicketkeeper batter Sanju Samson and feels he should be in the scheme of things but not at the cost of Rishabh Pant. Samson has been in tremendous form in recent times and scored consistently well in limited-over formats this year.
The 27-year-old hasn’t been able to cement a place in the Indian team as he also failed to get a place in the T20 World Cup squad. The selectors picked Rishabh Pant and Dinesh Karthik over the Kerala’s glovesman for the mega ICC event.
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Samson has scored 179 runs in 7 T20Is this year at an average of 44.75. While his numbers are even better in ODIs in 2022 with 248 runs in 9 matches at a sublime average of 82.66.
Jaffer was impressed with Samson’s performance in the ODI series against South Africa and said that he has silenced his critics with a consistent show against a quality bowling attack.
Samson slammed an unbeaten 86 runs in the first match to take the game to the final over, however, India ended up on the losing side. He also scored crucial 30* runs in the second match and remained unbeaten in the series-decider against South Africa.
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“Sanju Samson has definitely impressed me a lot. There’s always a question mark on his consistency but he showed that in this series. He couldn’t win India the game in the first match but finished the game in the second and remained not out in both (all three) games,” said Jaffer on ESPNCricinfo.
The veteran opener still feels there should not be any debate about replacing Rishabh Pant in the ODI team but Samson should be in the scheme of things.
“I feel we forget his series-winning century in England very easily. That was in one-day cricket. In T20 cricket, definitely, he’s not very consistent, especially at number four and five but in Test and one-dayers, I don’t think there’s any opposition for him yet. Although KL Rahul can keep wickets and Sanju Samson has been impressive, I don’t think you can think of replacing Rishabh Pant in one-day cricket. Sanju Samson should be in the scheme of things because of how he plays but not at the cost of Rishabh Pant,” said Jaffer.
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