Former Indian veteran spinner Harbhajan Singh is not impressed with Punjab Kings’ selection as the franchise decided to drop in-form Bhanuka Rajapaksha for bringing in Jonny Bairstow. Rajapaksha scored 83 runs for Punjab Kings in three matches at an average of 27.66 but most importantly he scored them at a strike rate of 230.55.
However, the Sri Lankan left-hander was dropped from the final XI when Jonny Bairstow was available for selection. But the move hasn’t paid dividends as Bairstow has failed to deliver the goods. The right-hander could only score nine runs against Delhi Capitals at the Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai on Wednesday.
The England batter has scored 41 runs in four matches for the Mohali-based franchise in the ongoing season and has failed to deliver the goods for the team.
Speaking to Sportskeeda, Harbhajan Singh said, “You should never drop a player who is in form. When someone is doing well for you and you drop him for Jonny Bairstow only for reputation and assume that he would score big runs, that doesn’t work. Whenever a player is doing well, you need to continue with him even if a senior player is sitting out because you need to think of the team first.”
Meanwhile, it has been noticed that Punjab Kings have adopted my way or highway approach in their batting line-up as all the batters are playing aggressively. The Turbanator reckons the team needs a batter who can play an anchor role in the middle overs.
“Punjab play the brand of cricket where they keep on attacking even if a couple of wickets or three wickets fall in the powerplay. Whenever you lose wickets, there needs to be a partnership through sensible batting, which they aren’t doing at the moment.”
“Punjab do need to find an anchor for their innings. Shikhar Dhawan can do that role but apart from him, all the other batters look to hit sixes. Don’t forget the basics of the game as even singles and doubles are a part of T20 cricket and not just sixes.”
Punjab batters have adopted an approach of going hard at the bowlers irrespective of the match situation. Thus, they might want to re-assess the situation and play a bit cautiously to post a par score on the board.
Punjab Kings will now look to bounce back stronger as they will next face defending champions Chennai Super Kings at the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai on Monday.
