Former Indian off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin lauded Rishabh Pant for his solid defense after a 1-3 loss in the Border-Gavaskar series against Australia. Pant had an immaculate record against Australia before the recently concluded series, aggregating 624 runs in seven matches at an average of 62.4.
But, the pugnacious southpaw batter managed only 255 runs in five Test matches at an average of 28.55. Barring scoring a total of 101 runs in the final Test at the SCG, Pant could not convert his starts into substantial scores in the series.
Furthermore, Pant was criticized for his shot selection in both innings after loss at the MCG. After tea break on the final day, Pant holed out at long-on while playing a big shot and it opened the door for Australia.
“We must realise that Rishabh Pant rarely gets out playing a defence. He’s got one of the best defences in world cricket. Defence has become a challenging aspect, he has the best defence with a soft hand. I have bowled to him a lot in the nets, he’s not gotten out, he doesn’t get an edge, he doesn’t get LBW, he has the best defence. I have tried telling it to him. One opinion about Rishabh was that he plays a lot of shots, he has to fight it out in Test cricket,” Ravichandran Ashwin, who retired after Brisbane Test, said on his YouTube Channel.
“I have always grown up hearing that you have fight it out. In Sydney, he played two different knocks in one single game. He got hit everywhere and scored a 40, it will be the least spoken innings of Rishabh Pant. It is very unfair. In the second innings, he scored a swashbuckling fifty, earning him a lot of praise. Everyone forgot that first innings and praised him for the second knock.”
Ashwin added that Pant is yet to realize his full potential and he will offer more to Indian cricket. Pant has already played some unbelievable knocks for the team in the red-ball version.
“We have to tell him properly what he has to do if he has to bat solid or bat with intent. He hasn’t scored a lot of runs, but he didn’t play like someone without runs. He has a lot of time on his hands. Rishabh Pant is yet to realise his fullest potential,” said Ashwin.
“He has all the shots—reverse sweep, slog sweep, everything—but the problem is that all these shots are high-risk shots. With his defence, he will surely score runs every game if he faces 200 balls. The point is finding that middle game. If he combines all of it, he will score 100 runs every game. He has to find that middle game.”
Pant will look to turn the tables in the white-ball formats.
