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‘Can’t take 25 balls to get set': Hardik Pandya called out for middle overs choke, Gambhir blamed for wasting Jurel


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‘Can’t take 25 balls to get set': Hardik Pandya called out for middle overs choke, Gambhir blamed for wasting Jurel

Parthiv Patel and Kevin Pietersen criticised Hardik Pandya for playing too many dot balls in the middle overs of the third T20I against England.

India's batters were choked by Adil Rashid (1/15), Jamie Overton (3/24) and Brydon Carse (2/28) in the middle overs as England came roaring back to stay alive in the five-match T20I series by beating India by 26 runs in the third T20I at the Niranjan Shah Stadium in Rajkot. Chasing 172 to take an unassailable 3-0 lead in the series, India's batters faltered and there was no Tilak Varma to bail them out of trouble this time around.

 

India's Hardik Pandya reacts during the 3rd T20I match against England, at Niranjan Shah Stadium in Rajkot(Surjeet Yadav)

India's Hardik Pandya reacts during the 3rd T20I match against England, at Niranjan Shah Stadium in Rajkot(Surjeet Yadav)

 

The left-hander was dismissed for the first time in five T20Is after being deceived by an absolute beauty from Rashid. After Tilak's dismissal, the Indian innings came to a standstill as Hardik Pandya, Washington Sundar, and Axar Patel failed to rotate the strike, let alone find the boundaries.

 

 

Between the 9th and the 16th over, India scored only 40 runs in seven overs at the loss of a wicket. That is where Hardik and Sundar really found it hard to get going before Overton ended the left-hander's (15 off 6) agonising stay in the middle.

Axar Patel, who came in to bat at No.7 could not break shackles as India's required rate kept rising.

Former India wicketkeeper-batter Parthiv Patel was critical of Hardik Pandya's knock. The experienced all-rounder ended up with 40 off 35 balls, but at one point, he was 21 off 24 balls. Parthiv said, "One cannot take 20-25 balls to get set in a T20I."

"Can't take 20-25 balls to get set. I understand taking your time but you have to keep rotating the strike. Hardik may have ended up with 40 off 35, but there were a lot of dot balls at the start of his innings," he said in the post-match show on Star Sports.

'India didn't get the batting order right'

Former England captain Kevin Pietersen was not happy with India's batting order, which was decided by the team management headed by coach Gautam Gambhir. Pietersen said India should have sent Jurel up the order instead of sending him at No/8.

 

"India didn't get the batting order right. Dhruv Jurel is an accomplished batter. Having him lower down the order for the left and right combination was not right. I'm a firm believer in your best batters batting up front," he said.

Parthiv said India overdid the left and right combination. "Left and right combination is alright till No.4 but after that you should send your best batters. Jurel is a proper batsman. He could have constructed a big innings," he added.

Earlier, Varun Chakaravarthy produced yet another stellar show with the ball, picking up his second five-wicket haul (5/24) to restrict England to 171/9. Ben Duckett was England's highest scorer with 51 off 28 balls.

 

 

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Hardik Pandya blasted as 'arrogant', 'overconfident' for controversial act involving Dhruv Jurel: 'One of the worst…'

 

Hardik Pandya ended up scoring 40 runs off 35 balls at a strike rate of 114.29 and was dismissed in the penultimate over as India crumbled under pressure.

Senior all-rounder Hardik Pandya failed to get India over the line in the third T20I as the hosts crumbled under pressure and blew the chance to take an unassailable lead in a five-match series. Chasing the 172-run target, India failed to hold their nerves on the slow track and were restricted to 145/9 in front of Adil Rashid (1/15), Jamie Overton (3/24) and Brydon Carse (2/28) in the middle overs.

 

India's Hardik Pandya walks back to the pavillion after being dismissed by England's Jamie Overton during the 3rd T20I, at Niranjan Shah Stadium in Rajkot.(ANI)

India's Hardik Pandya walks back to the pavillion after being dismissed by England's Jamie Overton during the 3rd T20I, at Niranjan Shah Stadium in Rajkot.(ANI)

 

Hardik, the Indian team's designated finisher, looked rusty at the start of his innings and exhausted too many deliveries before breaking the shackles. After the end of the 16th over, Hardik was batting on 23 off 27 balls. He did smash a six in the next over of Mark Wood's delivery and took his strike rate over 100.

 

 

The swashbuckling batter also smashed a six off Jofra Archer's ball in the 18th over but was dismissed in the 19th over, which shifted the momentum completely in England's favour.

He faced criticism from the fans for denying a single to Dhruv Jurel on the last ball of the 18th over when the latter hit the ball at the square leg near the boundary line, but the duo didn't take the single, so Hardik got the strike on the first ball of next over. However, it backfired for him and India as the star all-rounder went for a big shot on the first ball of Jamie Overton's over and got caught by Jos Buttler at long-off. He ended up scoring 40 runs off 35 balls at a strike rate of 114.29.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

India fail to bank on Varun's fifer

Apart from Hardik, other lower-middle order batters Washington Sundar (6), Axar Patel (15) and Dhruv Jurel (2) failed to score big as India failed to match the beat on the slow track.

Earlier, Varun Chakravarthy picked his second five-wicket haul in T20Is to give India some advantage while bowling but England overcame his 5-24 to beat the hosts by 26 runs to keep the series alive.

India had won the first two T20Is in Kolkata and Chennai by seven and two wickets, respectively. Pune will host the fourth match on Friday.

 

 

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11 minutes ago, Lone Wolf said:

Losing a random T20I bilateral is no big deal.

Pandu came clutch when we needed him in WT20.

 

Judge him based on his performance in CT.

 

He's been under target by you know who too. Deserves to be VC.

 

Bigger thing is playing Jurel and Sundar etc. GG is destroying even what's good lmao

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1 hour ago, Lord said:

 

He's been under target by you know who too. Deserves to be VC.

 

Bigger thing is playing Jurel and Sundar etc. GG is destroying even what's good lmao

Too many spinners are the problem.

They should trust Harshit and even his batting for a T20I.

 

Eng are playing Overton Carse too.

 

GG should include Ramandeep in next game.  Dube is terribly out of form and can't hit pace from ball 1.

 

If Rinku is fit he solves a lot of problems too.

 

Rinku and Nitish being out all of a sudden has disturbed the balance of the side. 

 

With Samson SKY Pandua Axar all out of form ..  this is a 2 man batting line up in Abhishek and Tilak.

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2 hours ago, Lord said:

 

He's been under target by you know who too. Deserves to be VC.

 

Bigger thing is playing Jurel and Sundar etc. GG is destroying even what's good lmao

Yep, he has lost the favor big time from the seniors and their backers. Indian players usually dont get attacked openly like this in media, let alone for useless bilateral matches. 

 

I think the seniors considered what he did underhanded and now he is paying the price, he has lost favor from selectors and other seniors. There is no way he should have lost vice captaincy with his experience. 

 

And media has been told to target him.

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Random bilateral match result doesn't bother me. Pandya was our best bet to win. So him retaining strike seems like the right thing. 

 

If anything, Gambhir's lack of planning and muddled thought process is what bothers me the most. Here's how I think about each player must be thinking.

 

1. Jurel - gets last game, plays a rash shot gets out. At least, the team won.. Gets another game, so he must be thinking the TM has confidence in him. But then he is sent down the order to play at 8 when the game is practically over. If you pick a batsman, why wouldn't you back him to go out and win the game for you. If you don't think he can win it, don't pick him at all.

 

2. Sundar - gets one over last game, picks a wicket, doesn't bowl after that.. this game, he bowls right when Ducket was going to hit out at the end of Power play. Goes for 15 and doesn't bowl after that..

Batting, we've seen time and again that Sundar is a technically correct but limited range batsman. He gets sent up the order at 6 with Jurel still waiting.. and plays a match losing innings 

 

Same thing for Sundar at MCG and SCG. Barely got to bowl. Got to bat with the tail after the game was lost.

 

Wonder what thinking and planning go on behind the scenes. I don't mind if they make a plan and stick to it, even if it fails in bilaterals. That's what bilaterals are for. But, you make a plan, but do something else, leaving players and fans confused. That's what makes it annoying. Wonder what Jurel will take away from this game and Sundar will take away from the MCG game.

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2 hours ago, bowl_out said:

Random bilateral match result doesn't bother me. Pandya was our best bet to win. So him retaining strike seems like the right thing. 

 

If anything, Gambhir's lack of planning and muddled thought process is what bothers me the most. Here's how I think about each player must be thinking.

 

1. Jurel - gets last game, plays a rash shot gets out. At least, the team won.. Gets another game, so he must be thinking the TM has confidence in him. But then he is sent down the order to play at 8 when the game is practically over. If you pick a batsman, why wouldn't you back him to go out and win the game for you. If you don't think he can win it, don't pick him at all.

 

2. Sundar - gets one over last game, picks a wicket, doesn't bowl after that.. this game, he bowls right when Ducket was going to hit out at the end of Power play. Goes for 15 and doesn't bowl after that..

Batting, we've seen time and again that Sundar is a technically correct but limited range batsman. He gets sent up the order at 6 with Jurel still waiting.. and plays a match losing innings 

 

Same thing for Sundar at MCG and SCG. Barely got to bowl. Got to bat with the tail after the game was lost.

 

Wonder what thinking and planning go on behind the scenes. I don't mind if they make a plan and stick to it, even if it fails in bilaterals. That's what bilaterals are for. But, you make a plan, but do something else, leaving players and fans confused. That's what makes it annoying. Wonder what Jurel will take away from this game and Sundar will take away from the MCG game.

Just no thinking going into some of these strategies. Sky is captain on the field, he seems to mechanically rotate bowlers and give a part timer an over just because he can bowl randomly. 

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11 hours ago, Lone Wolf said:

Losing a random T20I bilateral is no big deal.

Pandu came clutch when we needed him in WT20.

 

Judge him based on his performance in CT.

 

Losing is not the problem, the approach and thinking is. Pandya will be one of the first players on the team sheet in shorter formats but we need to figure out issues with team composition and batting order. How can you play likes of Sundar in T20s when he doesn't have the game for it and send him ahead of Jurel and Axar? Sundar basicallyt stalled the innings just like Jaddu used to do.

 

There're no power hitters down the order when we have likes of Rinku, Ramandeep, Nitish, Parag or even Ashutosh Sharma or Abdul Samad available. I don't believe every one of them is injured. The batting order was diabolical. Jurel is a proper bat and has to come in early. He should've come in ahead of Sundar. And if you're looking for a backup wkt keeper who can start hitting from ball one, Jitesh Sharma should've been picked instead of Jurel.

 

The only problem I found with Pandya was him refusing a single to Jurel. That was not on as Jurel is a specialist batter and that decision effectively undermined Jurel and showed lack of confidence in him in front of everyone. And Pandya deserves criticism for the same. I hope team management has a chat with him regarding his approach. But the bigger problems are the team selection, picking the right players for right formats (no place for Sundar and Jurel in T20s), and the batting order with no power hitters down the order.

Edited by Ultimate_Game
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