The Asia Cup 2022 provides a great opportunity for title holders India, and other teams, to test their team combination and get their out-of-form players back in form ahead of the showpiece ICC event of the year – the T20 World Cup 2022 which will be played in October-November in Australia.
India will kick off their Asia Cup 2022 campaign against neighbours Pakistan in Dubai.; this will be the first meeting between the two sides since Babar Azam’s side thrashed India at the T20 World Cup last year at this very venue.
India’s team seems much more balanced and in-form than they were last year. However, they will miss Jasprit Bumrah and Harshal Patel due to injuries.
India’s squad for Asia Cup 2022:
Rohit Sharma (Captain), KL Rahul (vice-captain), Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Deepak Hooda, Rishabh Pant (wicket-keeper), Dinesh Karthik (wicket-keeper), Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, R. Ashwin, Yuzvendra Chahal, Ravi Bishnoi, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Arshdeep Singh, Avesh Khan
Shreyas Iyer, Axar Patel and Deepak Chahar have been named as standbys
Here are the 3 players who will look to regain their form in the Asia Cup 2022:
Virat Kohli
Although there is no hint from the team management that they are doubting Virat Kohli’s place in India’s T20I eleven, many experts from outside feel that Virat Kohli will effectively be auditioning for the T20 World Cup at the Asia Cup 2022.
And these experts aren’t wrong. For Kohli has been in dismal form in recent times and is also short of match practice. He was disappointing during the IPL 2022 – average of 22 and strike rate of 115 – and then things got even horrific for the former captain – he couldn’t manage a single score of more than 20 in 6 innings in England.
Also, Kohli hasn’t played much cricket either – he had a one-month break between IPL and England tour, after which he has had another one-month break.
KL Rahul
KL Rahul will straightaway slot back into his opening position in the Asia Cup and now has been deemed fit for the Zimbabwe tour as well. Rahul has, quite strikingly, not played a single T20I for India this year so far owing to rest and injuries and covid.
He was in good form during the IPL 2022 – the LSG skipper finished as the second-highest scorer with 616 runs but his strike rate of 135 came under scrutiny. He will be asked to up that strike rate given India have adopted a new unprecedented gung-ho, aggressive approach under Sharma-Dravid. With good batting surfaces in the UAE, KL Rahul should enjoy himself opening and scoring quicker runs.
Ravindra Jadeja
Senior all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja has been having a rather muted year on the field and hasn’t really taken the world on fire in recent times. He had a terrible IPL 2022 – scoring 116 runs in 10 innings at a strike rate of 118 and only 5 wickets – where he also saw his captaincy being taken away.
He scored a century in the Edgbaston Test, but has been ordinary on the white-ball matches in England and West Indies. In the West Indies, he only played a couple of T20Is, scoring 43 runs and taking two wickets, while the injury cloud remains over him. The Asia Cup presents with a good opportunity for Jadeja to exhibit his fitness and regain a superb all-round form that he’s known for.
