The third T20 match played between India and New Zealand in Napier on Tuesday was a tie. With this result, India won the three-match series 1-0. The first match of this 3-match series was canceled due to rain. India won the second match and the third was tied.
The win comes as a sigh of relief after a humiliating 10-wicket defeat at the hands of England in the semi-finals of the World Cup. However, there is one problem which was our headache in the World Cup as well and there was no solution for it in the series against New Zealand.
In fact, this problem is older than the World Cup itself and has been frustrating Indian cricket fans for a long time now. The name of this problem is Rishabh Pant.
Pant, the match winner of Test cricket, is not able to perform at all in the T20 format. In this story, we will look at Pant’s T20 career so far and try to know how he has performed so far.
Rishabh Pant Bad record in T20Is: Only 3 half centuries in 66 matches
Pant has played 66 T20 Internationals so far and has crossed the 50-run mark only thrice. It is not that this is happening because of getting opportunities too low down the order. In 38 out of 66 matches, he got a chance to bat in the top 4, but he could not succeed.
Rishabh Pant has played matches in 8 countries so far in T20 International. Of these, the average is not impressive in any country other than the West Indies. In the West Indies, he scored 174 runs at an average of 58. He averages 7.25 in Australia, 13.50 in England, 15 in Sri Lanka, and 20 in India. Pant scored an average of 16 in America, 22 in New Zealand, and 32 in UAE.
After the continuous failure in the middle order, Pant also got many opportunities as an opener, but he has proved to be even lousy in this role. Pant has so far opened in 5 T20 Internationals and scored just 71 runs at an average of 14.20. Similarly, he could not do anything amazing even at number 3. He was sent to bat at number three 6 times. In this, he was able to score only 117 runs at an average of 29.25.
On one hand, Rishabh Pant is getting chances despite continuous flops, while on the other hand Sanju Samson is forced to sit on the bench. Samson was also kept in the squad for the series against New Zealand, but he did not get a chance in even a single match.
Whenever Pant comes out to play in the field for India, he remains a flop most of the time. But, playing with the franchise team in the Indian Premier League (IPL), a lot of runs come out of his bat. Pant has so far batted at a strike rate of 147.97 in 98 matches. He plays for Delhi Capitals in IPL. He scored 2,838 runs during this period at an average of 34.61.