Rohit Sharma has said that India haven’t yet identified who will replace Jasprit Bumrah in the playing XI in Australia in the T20 world cup.
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“Bumrah is out of world cup; that will be a big miss. We need to find a guy, I don’t know who that guy is yet, there are a few guys.. we will make that call in Australia,” Rohit said at the end of the third T20 against Australia.
He also jested a bit about Suryakumar Yadav’s form. “There are lots of areas of concern. To start with Surya’s form is a bit of concern (laughs!)” At the end of the second T20 he had joked that he might not play Suryakumar until the 23rd against Pakistan in the World Cup opener to preserve his form.
Moving on, he addressed the issues in bowling and said India needed to find a way.
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“We need to look at our bowling to see what more options we can find for in powerplay, middle overs and death overs. We are still working towards it. Guys need lot more clarity and it’s my job to make it happen. It’s a work in progress.”
India leave for Australia and will be based in Perth at the start. Rohit gave reasons why they chose that particular city as their base.
“Lot of guys haven’t been to Australia. That’s why we are going there early and also play on bouncy conditions in Perth to see what we do out there. Only 7-8 are of squad have gone to Australia before. We have organised couple of practice games in Western Australia plus there are two ICC practice games.”
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Indian bowling has been a concern. No one has really claimed the role of a death-overs specialist. Harshal Patel has leaked runs; so has Arshdeep Singh, and tonight at the third T20 even Deepak Chahar went for runs in his last two overs. Mohammad Shami couldn’t play a game after he picked up Covid-19 virus. Umesh Yadav has had a couple of games.
Former India batting coach Sanjay Bangar has picked Mohammad Shami as the replacement of Bumrah. “Since we already have Bhuvneshwar Kumar and he does a similar job as Deepak Chahar, we need someone with pace, who can get good bounce, and I will go with Mohammad Shami,” he told Star Sports.
