Rishabh Pant Will Be Fine, Says Sourav Ganguly On Wicketkeeper's Omission From India's Limited-Overs Squads

BCCI president Sourav Ganguly has dismissed any concerns over Rishabh Pant’s axing from Team India’s limited-overs squads for the tour of Australia as well as his poor form in the ongoing edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL).

The highly-rated wicketkeeper-batsman has been under pressure to deliver for quite some time now. Earlier this year, he lost his place in the ODI and T20 playing elevens with KL Rahul replacing him behind the stumps. He did not play a single white-ball game in New Zealand as India backed KL Rahul who made the most of the opportunity.

Last year, he had lost his place in the Test playing eleven with the team-management replacing him with Wriddhiman Saha for the home season. The left-handed batsman returned to the playing eleven during the Test series in New Zealand but failed to deliver, scoring just 60 runs in four innings as India lost both the Tests.

His form in the ongoing IPL has not been great either. In 11 games, he is yet to score a fifty and has scored 282 runs at a strike-rate of 112.35. Unsurprisingly, he has been facing criticism from several quarters.

Sourav Ganguly not concerned:

Sourav Ganguly, however, is not concerned with Rishabh Pant’s prolonged loss of form and has backed him to come good sooner rather than later. Ganguly also backed the youngster to get his bat swing soon and called him a tremendous talent.

“Don’t worry. His bat swing will come back. He is a young guy, and all of us need to guide him. He’s got tremendous talent. Rishabh will be fine. He and Wriddhiman Saha are our two best wicketkeeper-batsmen in the country,” Sourav Ganguly told PTI.

The wicketkeeper-batsman, nonetheless, has been named in the Test squad for the Australia tour. India are scheduled to play three ODIs, three T20Is and four Tests in Australia.

India’s ODI squad:

Virat Kohli (capt), Shikhar Dhawan, Shubman Gill, KL Rahul (vice-capt, wk), Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Hardik Pandya, Mayank Agarwal, Ravindra Jadeja, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Navdeep Saini, Shardul Thakur

T20I squad:

Virat Kohli (capt), Shikhar Dhawan, Mayank Agarwal, KL Rahul (vice-capt, wk), Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Hardik Pandya, Sanju Samson (wk), Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Navdeep Saini, Deepak Chahar, Varun Chakravarthy

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