Kedar Jadhav World Cup replacement: The Sportsrush presents before you three replacement for the injured Indian all-rounder.
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Kedar Jadhav has had a very unlucky career thus far. He always manages to get injured at the wrong time. A year back, he injured his hamstring again while playing his first match for CSK. Unfortunately, it has happened again.
Kedar Jadhav, while trying to dive and stop the ball in the match against KXIP, seems to have done some damage to his shoulder. He was seen walking out of the field after that incident and the CSK coach later confirmed that Jadhav is surely ruled out of IPL.
With the World Cup around the corner, the injury could not have come at a worse time for Jadhav who has been a constant in Team India over the cast couple of years whenever he isn’t injured.
We do hope he recovers on time for the World Cup. However, if he doesn’t, let us have a look at some of the players the selectors might consider replacing Jadhav with.
Kedar Jadhav World Cup replacement
Rishabh Pant
Rishabh Pant was considered extremely unlucky to have missed out on a World Cup berth. He has shown how well he can play and has also delivered in English conditions in the Test series last year. Pant has been a little inconsistent in ODIs for India. With just 93 runs in 4 innings at a disappointing average of 23.25, Pant has failed to impress.
However, he has been in great form in the ongoing IPL and has scored 401 runs already. It will be interesting to see if the selectors use IPL performance as a yardstick to select Pant for the World Cup as a pure batsman who can tonk the ball hard at No. 6. Pant would be the best option currently with the form he is in.
However, his ability to handle pressure in a big tournament like the World Cup remains in doubt considering he has withered whenever he was under pressure in the last few months and managed to give away his wicket.
Ambati Rayudu
Rayudu has one of the unluckiest cricketers in the last 10 years. He plays all the matches leading up to a big tournament and then falls out of favour just before that tournament. It happened in the 2015 World Cup and almost like a deja-vu, it is happening again.
In 50 ODI innings, Ambati Rayudu has scored 1694 runs at an average of 47.06. He has one of the highest averages for an Indian batsman and even the ICC considered it a shame that he missed out on a berth to the World Cup.
However, Rayudu has been woefully out of form off late. He failed to impress in the Australia series and was eventually dropped and has also failed for CSK this year scoring just 219 runs. He had made tongue in cheek remark against the selectors when he said that he would order 3D glasses to watch the World Cup.
The selectors had earlier said that Vijay Shankar was chosen ahead of Rayudu since Shankar is a three dimensional player who can contribute with bat, bowl and field. It will be interesting to see if the selectors take offence to this statement by Rayudu and decide that he isn’t right for a healthy team environment.
Manish Pandey / Shubman Gill
Both these batsmen are predominantly top order players and might fit the bill for the No. 4 slot in case Shankar fails to deliver there. Shankar can then come down the order.
Manish Pandey has been a disappointment in the India jersey. In the few chances which he was given, Pandey failed to leave a mark other than his maiden ODI century vs Australia at Sydney. With 440 runs in 18 innings at an average of 36.67, Pandey surely has the potential to be a long-term No. 4 for India.
Furthermore, Pandey has also performed well in the second half of this IPL and managed to score 314 runs for SRH. He is in good form and if the selectors decide to take IPL performance into consideration, Manish Pandey would surely present a strong case for a last minute berth to England.
Although 19-year old Shubman Gill has scored a paltry 16 runs in 2 ODIs, he has time and again proven his talent in the domestic circuit as well as the IPL now. Ever since he was promoted up the order, Gill has scored 3 half-centuries and ended the season with 296 runs in 13 innings.
Gill will surely make it to the Indian team soon. However, the selectors need to decide if this is the right time to draft in the young man into the team before a big World Cup.
