Veteran India off-spinner Harbhajan Singh has questioned the axing of senior leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal from the T20 World Cup squad, while Rahul Chahar was preferred in that role.
Chahar pipped Chahal when the latter was out of form, and the selectors labelled Chahar better suited to the UAE conditions. And despite Chahal’s return to form during the second half of IPL 2021, he was overlooked for Chahar, who didn’t feature in India’s four matches in the tournament.
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Harbhajan Singh has bluntly put out that he considers Chahar as a “better bowler” than the RCB leg-spinner.
“When they took Rahul Chahar over Yuzvendra Chahal for the T20 World Cup, they reasoned that he bowls quick which is why we selected him. Shortly after that, Chahal had a very good IPL outing.
“He took 15-16 wickets in the season (18 wickets in 15 matches). Meanwhile, Rahul Chahar hasn’t played a single game in the World Cup yet,” Harbhajan Singh said during commentary for Star Sports on Sunday.
“To be honest, I don’t accept that Chahar is a better bowler than Chahal. Chahal is a dangerous bowler and the number of matches he has won for the Indian team in the past show for it.”
Suddenly Kuldeep and Chahal are absent, and we are back to Ashwin-Jadeja: Harbhajan Singh
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Harbhajan Singh further said that he has been left puzzled by the decision-makers of the side for opting to recall R Ashwin, who they’d left out from white-ball sides in 2017. Ashwin then played ahead of Chahar against Afghanistan and Scotland, leaving the 41-year-old more bemused.
“And even when you selected Chahar, why didn’t you play him? Ashwin played ahead of him after the first two games. I didn’t understand that thought process. When Ashwin was dropped way back in 2017, you said we need wrist spinners.
“We brought Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav and they won us many games. Now suddenly, both Kuldeep and Chahal are absent and we are back to Ashwin and Jadeja. I don’t understand this,” Harbhajan Singh stated.
India will play their last game of the tournament on Monday, versus Namibia. This is also the last match for Virat Kohli as T20I captain and Ravi Shastri as the head coach.
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