Team India head coach Rahul Dravid attended a press conference ahead of Asia Cup 2023, confirming that KL Rahul will not be eligible to play in the Group A games for the Men in Blue. Rahul will thus sit out of India’s Asia Cup opening game against Pakistan on September 2, and will also miss the outing against Nepal. The wicketkeeper batter is likely to be fully fit for the Super 4 stage.
Iyer is therefore likely to feature for the opening two games, as Rahul Dravid broke his silence regarding the ‘experimentation’ at number 4 and number 5 batting positions. Since the 2019 ODI World Cup, the number 4 slot has been an Achilles heel, and the same problem recurred once again after Rahul and Iyer both picked up respective injuries in the months leading up to the ICC World Cup 2023 in October-November.
Rishabh Pant also had a car accident last year, which would rule him out of the ODI World Cup entirely. With three key players missing from the middle order, there has been a lot of chopping and changing in recent months.
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Sanju Samson, Suryakumar Yadav, and Ishan Kishan have all been auditioned but none of them was able to cement their place in the ODI team, and recently there were calls to include Tilak Varma as well, the youngster has indeed made the cut for India’s Asia Cup squad but he is yet to make his ODI debut.
Dravid meanwhile has silenced the experimentation debate once and for all, saying that there were only three candidates for the number 5, and number 4 slots, it was been Rahul, Rishabh and Shreyas, although the Indian had to make many changes due to the trio’s unavailability.
“People talk a lot about experimentation but even before 18-20 months, I could have told who were the candidates for the number 4 & 5 – it was always between KL (Rahul), (Rishabh) Pant & (Shreyas) Iyer but unfortunately all got injured together,” said Rahul Dravid in the presser on Tuesday, August 29.
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With Rahul set to miss the opening couple of games, Kishan is likely to retain his place behind the wickets, it remains to be seen where Ishan will bat as Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill and Virat Kohli are likely to take up the top 3 batting positions.
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