‘Their Role Will be More Than Others’: Rohit Sharma Keen to Use All 4 All-rounders Together

The Indian men’s cricket team have 4 all-rounders at their disposal in the T20 World Cup squad and skipper Rohit Sharma and the management will look to use all of them effectively throughout the tournament. Hardik Pandya and Shivam Dube are the pace-bowling all-rounders while Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel are the 2 left-arm spinners who can also play an important role with the bat.

Speaking ahead of the tournament opener against Ireland, Rohit did not rule out the possibility of playing all four in the playing eleven to ensure a longer batting line-up.

“If you want to create a good balance in a team, you need a lot of all-rounders. In fast-bowling all-rounders we have Hardik and Dube while Jadeja and Axar give us options in the spin department,” said Rohit.

“How to use these four across the tournament. We have thought about it and we will decide how to use them depending on the conditions. How to use these four players, is our focus.

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“We have seen how big a role all-rounders can play in T20 cricket. Not just in T20 cricket, but in all formats. Their role will be more than the rest of the players.

“It is important that we can use these four players well. As I said, I don’t know if we can play all four together. If we can, that will be good. If we cannot, even then we have to find our way,” said the skipper.

Besides Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel, wrist spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal are also part of the potent attack.

“When we played the game with Bangladesh, all three spinners bowled two overs. It wasn’t that easy to hit them. And in yesterday’s match (SA versus SL), the spinners also took wickets. No one knows the conditions.

“The spinners will take wickets or the seamers will take. So, we possibly… We have to find the best combination and see what will suit our team. How can we keep our batting lineup longer? How can we have more bowling options? So, keeping these two things in mind, we will think of making a combination,” he said.

With the way the pitch behaved at Nassau International Cricket Ground on Monday, expecting high scores witnessed in the recent IPL would be a tad too much.

India had the advantage of playing a warm-up against Bangladesh before facing Ireland, Pakistan and the USA in the tournament proper.

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“Certainly it doesn’t look like a place where you can score easily. So we’ve got to be a little mindful of that and see what best we can do. That is what the experience in the dressing room is all about and we have got a lot of that.

“We are all coming off playing in IPL where a lot of runs were scored, so it’s important to have that balance, and understand what is required here. It’s certainly not going to be an IPL kind of score here, so we are very mindful of that and we just need to assess as quickly as possible and then bring your game into the picture,” said Rohit.