Sir, The Way We Are Batting, We Don't Need Six Batters- R Sridhar Reveals Chat With 'Team Man' Hanuma Vihari

Former fielding coach of Team India, R Sridhar, opened up on a chat with Indian Test batter, Hanuma Vihari, who asked for his exclusion from the playing XI as it was not the best combination to play with at home.

Vihari was part of the first Test against South Africa at home, just after scoring a century away in West Indies. However, he didn’t feel like he was needed in the team which had batsmen playing in the form of their lives. Therefore, he asked Sridhar to do something about it.

“During that Vizag Test, I remember he came to me and said ‘Sir, I should not have played this Test’. Hanuma had played that Test because he had got a hundred in the previous Test in Jamaica. In India, we play with certain combinations… We still won that Test match on Day 5 but it took the class of Shami to get us there and took so much out of him.”

“He said, ‘Sir, next Test I shouldn’t play. We should play with an extra bowler because the way we are batting, we don’t need six batters’. Rohit was on fire in that series, Mayank was batting brilliantly at that time and it was also his first Test in India. Hanuma knew that the captain of the team would always keep the team ahead of him. He understands,” Sridhar told in an interview with Cricbuzz.

“Tactically, one of the best I’ve seen” – R Sridhar on Hanuma Vihari

Sridhar also lavished praise on the tactical aspect of Vihari, who he believes is quite a brilliant reader of the game. There have been situations where Vihari has offered inputs to the Indian management.

“Hanuma is a terrific reader of the game. Tactically, he’s one of the best I have seen, he has such a good sense of the game. Even with the Indian team, when he was in the reserves, he used to come up with very good tactical inputs.”

“In Melbourne (in 2018), when Ravi (Shastri) told him that you might have to open, he put his hand up and said, ‘no problem. I will play. He understands the game, knows what the team requires and I haven’t seen him get flustered by not getting his opportunities to play,” Sridhar added.

Also Read- IND vs SL: If Virat Kohli Is Comfortable At No. 4, Don’t Disturb Him- Sunil Gavaskar