Lucknow Super Giants leg-spinner Ravi Bishnoi has picked Abhishek Sharma as the toughest Indian batter to bowl to after IPL 2025. Bishnoi said he felt he needed to bring something extra while bowling to the left-hander.
Sharma is currently the number one T20I-ranked batter and he has been performing consistently in the shortest format. The southpaw scored 439 runs in 13 innings in IPL 2025 at an average of 33.77 and a blistering strike rate of 193.39 for Sunrisers Hyderabad.
Sharma scored 59 runs off just 20 balls in Match 61 of the previous season of the IPL against Lucknow Super Giants and had helped his team chase down the target of 206. Bishnoi was taken for 26 runs in the solitary over he bowled, in which Abhishek smashed him for four sixes in a row.
Ravi Bishnoi said on the YouTube podcast Game Changers, “Right now, I think Abhishek Sharma is batting really well. Against him, I feel I need to bring something extra from my side. As a leg-spinner, I feel he plays me quite well. He has worked very hard in the off-season, and even now you can see him putting in the effort day in and day out. The way he is batting, I always think about how I can improve against him. I keep trying to figure out how I can get better when I bowl to such good batters.”
On the other hand, Bishnoi also lavished praise on Yashasvi Jaiswal. The southpaw recently scored 411 runs in five Test matches against England at an average of 41.10.
“You must have seen, in the Under-19 tournament he was the Player of the Series. The way he played, even in the final he was the one who scored the runs. Before that, he had scored a hundred against Pakistan, so that has always made him stand out. Because when he plays, you only see him, no one else around him. That is his art, and his command over his game is excellent.”
Bishnoi also recalled a conversation with Jaiswal, in which the left-handed opener talked about his mindset.
“Once, in a conversation, he told me, ‘If I feel that 20 runs can be scored in this over, then I want 20 runs in it. I cannot compromise for less.’ That really impressed me. Even if 18 or 19 runs come, he insists, ‘No, no, I had said three boundaries, so there must be three.’ That shows his hunger, that he cannot settle for less. He wants the full thing that he feels is his,” he added.
Jaiswal is part of the standby players for the upcoming Asia Cup.
