Indian captain Rohit Sharma shared the rationale behind speedster Umesh Yadav’s selection ahead of team India’s clash against Australia in the first match of the T20I series in Mohali on Sunday. Addressing a press conference, the star batter mentioned that Umesh Yadav is a quality bowler who has proven himself and gives the side a good option with the new ball upfront. Umesh Yadav was drafted in the side for the Australia T20 series after pacer Mohammed Shami tested positive for Covid on Sunday.
Yadav has not featured for the Indian side in T20Is in the past two years and turned heads after he was called for the Aussie assignment.
Talking about other options, the captain said, “Few options were there. Prasidh is injured, Siraj is playing county and we didn’t want to fly him in just for a game or two. Avesh was sick in Asia Cup, he will take time to rebuild his fitness.”
“Guys like Umesh, Shami don’t need to be playing a particular format to succeed at it. They have proven themselves. It’s the quality. Young guys need to prove but not them. If they are fit and available they will be called back. We don’t need to look at form. We saw how well Umesh yadav bowled in the IPL. He bowled pretty well. He gives us option to use upfront with the new ball, swings the ball, bowls fast so not a much debate about him,” explained Rohit about Umesh’s inclusion in the team.
The righ-hander also talked about the importance of the series and said that series such as these help in getting a better understanding of the team.
“Important to play such series, we find out about players, what they can do in different situations. I’ll never say we are a perfect team, all we can do is prepare, keep learning and improving, important to have modesty, challenging series as they are top two teams,” said Rohit. India’s batter also gave clarity about the attacking approach that the team has opted to go with and the brand of aggressive cricket that it’s going to play.
“We will continue to play that way, we talked about that and everyone was comfortable with it. We know what our second line of defense is when we are in trouble. We have spend a lot of time talking about these things. The guys know how they are to play when 10/3 or when we are at 50/0. We have talked about such things at length and now it’s just about going on the field and executing it,” said the Indian captain.