Amid coronavirus pandemic, almost every country is facing a lockdown and due to which many sporting events have been cancelled, including a significant cricket tournament – Indian Premier League (IPL). The BCCI has postponed the 13th season of the cash-rich league for an indefinite time.
In the meantime, cricketers who were supposed to play in the IPL 2020, are now taking part in chat sessions on various social media platforms. In the process, Suresh Raina joined an Instagram live session organised by Yuzvendra Chahal.
During the chat, Raina heaped praises on youngster Rishabh Pant and opined that latter is a match-winner and should be backed by the Indian team management. Raina also said that Pant reminds him of players like Yuvraj Singh and Virender Sehwag and he can be as dominant as Yuvi or Viru.
“He (Pant) is a top cricketer when he plays well, you become happy, and he reminds of Yuvraj and Sehwag, he is as dominant as them, when he plays the flick, it reminds you of Dravid as well,” Raina told Chahal.
Pant has shown calibre in the longest format of the game. In 13 Tests, the Delhi-born has scored 814 runs with 2 hundreds and as many half-centuries. In fact, despite being labelled as a T20 cricketer, Pant averages the highest in the red-ball format. In Test cricket, the southpaw averages 38.8 while in ODIs and T20Is, he averages 26.7 and 20.5, and hasn’t smashed a ton in either of these two formats.
Meanwhile, Raina also hailed current Team India’s skipper Virat Kohli and regarded him as a reliable captain who brings energy to the field and has the ability to control things.
“Virat is a solid captain, he has a lot of energy, he can control things, when you are playing shorter formats, you need a lot of energy and passion,” the 33-year-old added.
Earlier, Indian deputy Rohit Sharma stated that Pant goes through a lot of scrutiny. Rohit even advised the media to think before writing anything for a youngster as it can demoralise the talented batter.
“I talk to Rishabh Pant more, he is just 20-21, he was under so much of scrutiny that he got tensed. Media thinks its part of their job to write, but they should be sensible and think before writing something as it plays a huge part,” Rohit Sharma had said.
