Former Indian Test opener Aakash Chopra praised Harshit Rana for his bowling performance in the third T20I against England at Trent Bridge, Nottingham on Tuesday. Chopra said the fast bowler is unfairly criticised on social media but he consistently delivers the goods for the team.
Rana returned with figures of 2-40 in his quota of four overs against the home team. The Delhi pacer accounted for previous match hero Jacob Bethell and Tom Banton on consecutive deliveries in the 12th over of the innings.
However, Rana’s efforts went in vain as India suffered an ignominious loss of 125 runs after they were skittled out for a paltry score of 76 in the run chase of 202. This is India’s biggest loss in T20Is.
“Harshit Rana needs to be spoken about. We troll him a lot, but Harshit Rana is doing the job whenever he is getting opportunities. He does the job in bowling. He bowls the difficult overs. He comes and delivers. He packs a punch. He had almost won the Ireland match with his batting,” Chopra said on his YouTube Channel.
“So, he is doing his bit. He bowls with the new and old ball, and if you send him up the order in batting, he does what he can. Please cut him some slack. Him being selected is not his mistake. Talk to the selectors if you have a problem with his selection. However, if a player does well, we all must stand up and clap. He is unnecessarily trolled a lot,” he added.
On the other hand, Prince Yadav replaced Ravi Bishnoi in India’s playing XI. The fast bowler bowled a scorching yorker to get rid of Jos Buttler on the first delivery he bowled. Yadav eventually returned with figures of 2-30 in his quota of four overs.
“The excellent thing that has happened is Prince Yadav. The first ball he hit on Jos Buttler’s stumps, it’s extremely difficult to bowl a yorker with the new ball, and he bowled it absolutely precisely. He almost felled Jos Buttler to his knees. That was a stellar ball to begin with. It was an incredible ball bowled by Prince Yadav,” he said.
“He was played in place of Ravi Bishnoi, which we had expected. After that, he dismissed Harry Brook. The ball hit slightly high on the bat, and a fielder was present in the deep. In fact, he would have got three wickets had Harshit taken the catch. So Prince Yadav has done really well. A lot of promise, really high ceiling, which is a good thing,” Chopra observed.
The fourth T20I between England and India will be played at Bristol, County Ground on Thursday.
