Sachin Tendulkar urges India to add more variety to their middle order

Sachin Tendulkar (Source: Twitter)

Indian legend Sachin Tendulkar has urged the Men in Blue to consider drafting in a left hander in the middle order. 

There has been constant debate on whether team India should opt for Dinesh Karthik or Rishabh Pant in the T20 World Cup 2022. While Tendulkar refrained from naming his picks for the middle order, he believes that adding a bit of variety to the batting lineup could work in India's favour. 

India have a formidable batting lineup of Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Virat Kohli, Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya and Dinesh Karthik as their top six, but they are missing some much-needed variety in there. 

Someone like Pant would add a new dimension to the middle order and give the opposition bowlers something to think about. Right hand-left hand combinations are always difficult to bowl to and it would cause problems for the fielders as well. 

That said, Karthik has been a man in form in recent T20Is and dropping him in favour of Pant, who is yet to prove his mettle in the shortest format of the game would be an unfair decision from the management. 

India wouldn't have been in this conundrum had Ravindra Jadeja been fit for the premier event. The left-hander adds a lot of dynamism in the lower-middle order with his flamboyant batting style. 

Speaking to the media, Sachin Tendulkar said (via News18): 

“Left-handers without any doubt add in value and bowlers have to adjust, fielders have to adjust, and if they are able to rotate strike consistently, it is not something that the bowler enjoys.

“Look, I wouldn’t go by just (top) three. You always play as a unit and one should see what works well. You can’t go by top two or top three. As a unit, what you have is important and then to figure out whom to send at what position, and also check what is the opposition’s strength."

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