"It's because they want to fit in Virat Kohli in that XI"- Ex-Indian wicket-keeper makes a huge claim on India's weird plans
On Friday, India registered a thumping win over West Indies in the first T20I at Brian Lara Stadium. The visitors won the match by a margin of 68 runs and took a lead of 1-0 in the five-match series. After winning the toss, the hosts put India to bat first. They got off to a decent start.
Skipper Rohit Sharma scored his 27th T20I half-century and made 64 runs. But India lost a few quick wickets in the middle. But a brilliant unbeaten cameo from veteran wicket-keeper batter Dinesh Karthik helped the team to reach a big total of 190/6 in 20 overs.
DK made an unbeaten 41 off just 19 balls with four fours and two sixes. In reply, West Indies couldn't get going and the Indian bowlers restricted them to a score of 122/8 and won the match.
Although India almost ticked all the boxes, one thing that didn't go well with many former cricketers and fans was that Suryakumar Yadav came to open the innings with Rohit, which was a totally strange tactic from India. Notably, SKY recently scored a brilliant century against England, batting at no. 4.
However, this is also not the first time that India has made changes at the top of the order. Earlier, Rishabh Pant also opened for India against England in T20Is. At home against Sri Lanka, it was Ishan Kishan who opened with Rohit prior to IPL 2022. Former Indian wicket-keeper batsman Parthiv Patel shared his thoughts on this experiment.
Parthiv reckons that India are trying to put in Virat Kohli in the playing XI. In a discussion on Cricbuzz, he said that he would have liked to see Virat play against West Indies in both the ODI and T20I series. He highlighted that playing the 50-over game, we get a lot of time and Shikhar Dhawan and Shubman Gill got into good form and scored runs.
Parthiv also added, "All these changes we are seeing in the opening order, that's happening because they want to try and fit in Virat Kohli in that XI. That's the reason we are seeing Surya and Rishabh Pant opening. That's something I feel."
Virat has been given a break from this West Indies tour. He was part of the Indian team in all three formats in England. However, he didn't do well on that tour. His highest score was 20 runs in 6 innings across all three formats.