Rishabh Pant vs. Dinesh Karthik

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As the World Cup draws near, the cricketing world is split over who should be a part of Team India’s squad. Dinesh Kartik or Rishabh Pant? Both are keen to be the one who is chosen and have gone full throttle into their efforts.

Pant has been seen to often train by hitting balls into the nets, before and after matches and is the first player to don the team kit and the last one to take it off. However, he has been benched frequently and missed recent matches with South Africa and Australia. He also failed to leave a mark at the Asia Cup where he played thrice in four matches and didn’t score too many runs except against Afghanistan. In contrast, when in top form, Pant has scored some big runs and under the mentorship of coach Ravi Shastri has displayed his true potential, which has so far eluded him in T20Is.

Meanwhile matters have also been grim for Dinesh Karthik, who has not played much cricket recently either, and missed playing in the game in Trivandrum, while only hitting 8 balls in 3 games against Australia. At the Asia Cup too Karthik played one ball in three games, and with a total of 95 balls played in his last 17 games, he has averaged a meagre 5 balls per game.

While India’s top order batting is currently in impeccable form and the middle order rarely needed to play a major role, it is risky for India to have both Karthik and Pant facing a slump in form. In the previous T20 World Cup, India’s top batters including Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul and Suryakumar Yadav failed to stand up to Pakistan, and Kohli was the sole player to salvage the performance. If such a situation were to repeat, then the middle order is the last line of defence. With the primary responsibility of rescuing the team’s performance when the top order falls, both Pant and Karthik must step up their game to fulfill their role in the team.