Rishabh Pant opening ODI record: The Indian wicket-keeper batter has been promoted to open the batting in Ahmedabad today.
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During the second ODI of the ongoing West Indies tour of India in Ahmedabad, West Indies stand-in captain Nicholas Pooran has won the toss and chose to field.
“We will bowl first. We’re staying in the present, the goal is to play a good brand of cricket for the entire duration of the game,” Pooran told Star Sports at the toss in his first-ever ODI as a captain.
Having said that, Pooran has led West Indies in eight T20Is in the past. Readers must note that Pooran is leading West Indies because regular captain Kieron Pollard has suffered a niggle. All-rounder Odean Smith has replaced Pollard in the Playing XI.
India captain Rohit Sharma remained unaffected after being asked to bat first as he was looking to do the same upon winning the toss. Much like West Indies, India have also made a lone change by bringing in batter Lokesh Rahul for Ishan Kishan.
“It’s going to be a challenging one, we always wanted to bat first, put the score on the board and today gives us a chance. We’re not thinking too far ahead at the moment, if we do the things right, we will always do well and get the runs on the board. One change for us – KL Rahul comes back in place of Ishan Kishan,” Sharma told Star Sports at the toss.
Rishabh Pant opening ODI record
The decision to not give Kishan (left out to accommodate Rahul) more than one opportunity ended up disappointing a few fans. At first, it appeared that India would open the innings with Sharma and Rahul. With the latter doing much better in ODIs in the middle-order, there have been suggestions of batting him in the middle-order than at the top of the order.
However, fans were left surprised when Sharma walked out to open the batting with wicket-keeper batter Rishabh Pant. In what is a highly unconventional decision for the Indian team’s standards, the prospect of a hard-hitter in Pant opening the batting sounds fascinating.
It is for the first time that Pant is opening the batting in international cricket. The highest that he had batted in his 22-match ODI career before today was No. 4.
Rishabh Pant Under 19 record as opener
It is noteworthy that all of Pant’s 11 innings during his U-19 days had come as an opening batter. As an opener in YODIs, Pant had scored 454 runs at an average and strike rate of 41.27 and 110.46 respectively including one century and four half-centuries.
