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Dev Tyagi ∙ Jul 29 2022, 5:33 PM

Shimron Hetmyer: The headliner of West Indies cricket

image-l66qokrbShimron Hetmyer at his supreame

Shimron Hetmyer needs the West Indies team as much as the Windies need Shimron Hetmyer. 

Think of it like Yin needs Yang and the star needs the galaxy. 

Can the two exist in isolation? What would even happen in such a situation?

Though importantly, on whom does the responsibility of taking the light far and wide rest? 

The star alone? Solely, the universe? 

Maybe that’s a debate for another day. 

What isn’t, however, and must be addressed urgently is that Shimron Hetmyer needs to get back into the groove as soon as possible. 

Much like that urgent e-mail carrying the breakthrough presentation that you’re asked to deliver to the boss’s inbox without further ado. 

That’s even if you’ve only just got back to the office. Not that you had asked for a holiday and were enjoying your leave without pay; it’s just that you were declared unfit for work. 

And bang. That was then. It’s changed now. All of it. 

The time to deliver is now. And guess what? If you don’t- let’s say, presumably, one doesn’t know whether you’ll be part of the big presentation to the foreign delegation, which isn’t that far away anyway. 

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Crib about it. Or revel amid the challenge; the choice is Shimron Hetmyer’s. 

All of 25, Hetmyer is 42 T20Is old in the game already with 666 runs, including three fifties. 

And that’s not it: a strike rate touching 119, which isn’t mind boggling. 

Something he’d like to improve upon. What better moment than now against India to do it. 

There’s a reason to this as well. 178 of his 666 runs have come against India, the very team he’s ready to face. 

While he’s only scored a solitary fifty against India of the three he’s scored overall, Hetmyer will ideally see this series as a great opportunity to hit back form and with it, seal his spot for the fast approaching T20 World Cup. 

Moreover, he has a great opportunity to make heads turn. The West Indies need him to do so; he needs their platform to set the record straight once and for all regarding his form and fitness, importantly. 

There’s an added reason to this as well. Evin Lewis isn’t there. Effectively speaking, Russell isn’t going to return anytime soon unless the Windies board takes a sudden radical call about the musical Jamaican. But then who does the team replace and get back the KKR star?

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Want more? 

Carlos Brathwaite is, unfortunately or fortunately, a thing of the past. Roston Chase, CPL hero last season but an utter failure in the previous T20 World Cup, isn’t in the T20I fold anymore. That’s, at least, for now. 

What better opportunity does Hetmyer- passionate, restless, a bit too chubby according to his critics- have to prove them wrong? 

But maybe, he’d want to take the wiser road of proving no one else but himself that he’s still the same lad who fired sixes at pomp and still does. And doesn’t only do that, but makes the vital thoughtful runs when needed by his West Indies.