Former Indian cricketer Irfan Pathan slammed the young and talented Rishabh Pant for not playing responsibly during the World Test Championship’s final, which India lost by 8 wickets at the hand of New Zealand. Rishabh’s wicket became the turning point for the game for India.
Though Rishabh Pant t played a powerful knock on the reserve day of the WTC Final against New Zealand before he decided to charge against Trent Boult, which cost him his wicket. Following his wicket, the Indian cricket team lost all the wickets in quick succession. Also, a debate has been going on about Pant’s bold approach. Several cricketers and pundits have given their opinion on the matter. The latest one to give his opinion is former Indian cricketer Irfan Pathan.
Recently, during a discussion on Star Sports, Irfan Pathan talked about the performance of Rishabh Pant and where he went wrong. Pathan feels that a destructive batsman like Pant, should have acted more responsibly, especially in a tough situation where team India was.
“I know Rishabh Pant plays very well in a destructive fashion. But destructive batting doesn’t mean that you walk down the wicket to pace bowlers and try to hit them out of the ground. Some responsibility was required,”
He added:
“If we talk about proper cricketing reasons where we went wrong in this match, it was even after the first innings. But after that, the second innings batting was extremely disappointing because the ball was not moving that much in the second innings. So, they could have batted more responsibly there.”
Furthermore, Irfan made another point about India’s aggressive approach against the short-pitches deliveries. Pathan feels that team India could have seen the short stuff through. He also claimed that India could have gone ahead with another batsman in their team, preferably a seam-bowling all-rounder. He said:
“I also felt that when they were bowling the bouncers against the Indian batsmen, they were trying to play the pull shot instead of taking it on the body. It means there a slight shortage of commitment was also seen,”
He added:
“They played a batsman short. I was saying this even before the Test match started but that is my thinking. Then we do not have a fast-bowling all-rounder like New Zealand have. Getting one in is also slightly difficult.”
