Despite pointing at the batting disaster as one of the major reasons of series failure, the Indian captain went on to back his teammates. He defended the selection of wicketkeeper-batsman Rishabh Pant and shared his thoughts.
Kohli on Rishabh Pant
Rishabh Pant’s selection as a keeper batsman instead of Wriddhiman Saha was much talked about. Saha’s brilliant keeping was not taken into consideration by the captain and team management while selecting playing XI against New Zealand. Pant, however, failed to justify the same and accumulated only 60 runs in two Test matches with the highest score being 25.
After losing the Test series 2-0 against the hosts, Virat Kohli obviously had to face unpleasant questions and one of them was Pant’s selection. Kohli explained that none of his teammates is taking the place for granted. According to him, all work hard to get a deserving chance and do not think that they would play every game. “We have given a lot of chances to Rishabh, you need to figure out when is the right time to give someone a chance. I don’t see anyone taking their place for granted in this team, no one here has come in thinking that I am going to play every game.”
Pant earned his place
It has been a long time that Rishabh Pant is being criticised for his batting approach, keeping, and overall performance. He has been visibly struggling to do well on the 22 yards. But he was still preferred over Wriddhiman Saha. Kohli has explained the situation in the post-match conference.
The skipper said that the young keeper had worked very had and hence earned his opportunities. “Rishabh has worked very hard behind the scenes, so we thought of giving him a chance in this series. We thought he will come good in this series, but as a collective unit, we did not show a good batting performance.”
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