Former Indian assistant coach Abhishek Nayar said he wants India to play swashbuckling batter Vaibhav Sooryavanshi in the playing XI for the fifth T20I against the West Indies. However, Nayar added he would not want the youngster to bat out of position.
Sooryavanshi hasn’t received his chance in the first four matches of the series. After the T20I series against Afghanistan, head coach Gautam Gambhir said in the press conference that Sooryavanshi will need to wait for his chances.
The young prodigy batter returned with scores of 38 and 15 in the semifinal and final clash of the Asian Games against Sri Lanka and Pakistan respectively.
“I am very tempted. Are you going to play Vaibhav Suryavanshi out of position? I wouldn’t want to see that. If Vaibhav Suryavanshi plays, he should play at his strongest position, which is opening,” Abhishek Nayar said on JioHotstar.
Nayar said he wouldn’t want to demote Ishan Kishan from the number three position to make a place for Sooryavanshi.
“If he opens, the one who is playing at No. 3 should play at his strongest position. No matter how much I am tempted, and I want to see Vaibhav Suryavanshi, that too in Bengaluru, I would make changes in bowling and not at all in batting,” Nayar observed.
The former Indian batter backed Kuldeep Yadav to replace Naman Dhir in the starting XI.
“I would take a punt here, and try and go the Kuldeep Yadav way. So, I may replace a Naman Dhir with a Kuldeep Yadav and get Nitish Kumar Reddy one position up, and then Axar Patel. I think Axar Patel has also played that role really well for Team India when he is sent up as a floater,” he said.
The KKR head coach said India should field four attacking bowlers, subject to Arshdeep Singh’s availability.
“The last four are going to be attacking options, depending on Arshdeep’s fitness and how his shoulder is, because he got hit on his shoulder. That’s going to be something I am going to be really keen to look at as to how that pans out,” Nayar observed.
Abhishek Nayar’s India playing XI for fifth T20I against the West Indies: Sanju Samson, Abhishek Sharma, Ishan Kishan, Shreyas Iyer, Tilak Varma, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Prince Yadav, Arshdeep Singh, Mayank Yadav.
