Gaurav Kapur Trolled KL Rahul After Rishabh Pant’s Promotion: In a surprising move by India, Rishabh Pant was sent to open alongside Rohit Sharma in the second ODI versus West Indies on Wednesday in Ahmedabad. This was shocking considering the return of vice-captain and opener KL Rahul, who missed the first ODI due to personal reasons and was back in the eleven replacing Ishan Kishan who opened in the first ODI.
Rishabh Pant has never opened in international cricket in any of his previous 91 innings before today, while Rahul was shifted at number 4, a position which the management hoped to nail down soon.
Pant had, however, opened the innings during the 2016 under-19 World Cup and he smashed 78 runs off 24 balls against Nepal under-19. Although Pant has experience in opening the batting, there is a huge difference in doing it at the under-19 level and senior level.
As the game was about to get underway, fans were left stunned when they saw Pant jogging in the middle alongside Rohit Sharma as the opening pair.
“Sir, I think answer is Ahmedabad”
Sir, I think answer is Ahmedabad ?? https://t.co/YhNhb2ckCp
— Gaurav Kapur (@gauravkapur) February 9, 2022
This move was also possible because both Shikhar Dhawan and Ruturaj Gaikwad are in quarantine after testing positive for covid-19 before the first ODI. However, Mayank Agarwal would have been available but the management went with Pant as an opener and slotted Rahul to number 4. It remains to be seen what decision will be made when Dhawan is available in the third ODI or the next series.
Meanwhile, the experiment with Rishabh Pant as an opener didn’t pay off for India as the left-hander got out for 18 runs from 34 balls. He never looked settled and played a couple of expansive shots, but was done by the extra bounce from Odean Smith as he mistimed his pull.
