One would imagine that after scoring a 46-ball century in your second-ever T20I, it would book you a place. But when you are competing for a spot on the Indian cricket team, nothing comes easy. Sanju Samson has been going through this for years and even suffered disappointment yesterday, but another player, who’s just started his career, was also let down. Abhishek Sharma, who was on an all-time high on July 7, will now have to sit at home and watch his teammates from the Zimbabwe tour play in the IND vs SL T20I series.
Parag over Abhishek, the right choice?
What might be even more infuriating is that someone who underperformed was picked ahead of him. Riyan Parag, who managed to score just 24 runs on the Zimbabwe tour, has been selected ahead of Abhishek. Why? Well, right now, that remains a mystery.
With just Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shubman Gill present as the openers, surely Abhishek could have been slotted in. Meanwhile, Parag, who’s a middle-order batter, will have stiff competition and will have to fight for a place in the IND vs SL ODIs against the likes of Sanju Samson, Rishabh Pant, and Shivam Dube.
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Perfect powerplay batter
Apart from that century, Abhishek scored 10, 0, and 14. Those scores aren’t great, but the southpaw’s brilliance in the IPL 2024 season can’t be overlooked. He maximized the powerplay to the fullest and had a 202 strike rate. The only thing he didn’t do was score a big one. That, he ticked off with his record-breaking ton in Harare.
Abhishek may have fallen for low scores in the other games, but he did so while trying to get the team off to a rollicking start. He had the highest strike rate for anyone who’s scored over 330 runs in the entire season. Despite scoring just 124 runs in the India vs Zimbabwe series, no one who managed to score over 60 runs had a better strike rate than him.
Abhishek Sharma IPL 2024 stats
| Inn | Runs | Avg | SR | 50s/100s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 | 484 | 32.27 | 204.21 | 3/0 |
India T20I squad for Sri Lanka series
Suryakumar Yadav (c), Ꮪhubman Gill (vc), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rinku Singh, Riyan Parag, Rishabh Pant (wk), Sanju Samson (wk), Hardik Pandya, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh, Khaleel Ahmed, Mohammed Siraj.
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