'Three Fast Bowlers And Arshdeep to Handle Death Bowling': Former India Allrounder Picks His Playing XI For T20 World Cup

The BCCI have named their 15-man squad for the upcoming T20 World cup and despite all the hullaballoo, KL Rahul and Dinesh Karthik have retained their place. While Avesh Khan has been dropped, young Arshdeep Singh has been named in the side. Now, the question is what will be the playing eleven when they will be out against arch-rivals Pakistan in the T20 World Cup opener. Let’s not forget that they will have six games (three vs Australia, and three vs South Africa) before they land in Australia where they will also play two two warm-up games.

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Speaking exclusively on Star Sports show ‘Follow The Blues’, former chairman of the selection committee Krishnamachari Srikkanth and former ICC T20 World Cup Winner Irfan Pathan gave their preferred Playing XI for the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup.

“My playing 11, wherever you play, whether you’re playing in Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney or Perth, my playing 11 is always fixed. For the first game – KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli – number three, Suryakumar Yadav – number four, number five is Hardik Pandya, number six is Rishabh Pant, number seven – Ashwin, eight – Chahal, 9, 10, 11 – in this particular team will be Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, (Jasprit) Bumrah and of course Harshal Patel," said Srikkanth.

Furthermore former India pacer Irfan Pathan had a slightly different outlook.

“See, in my opinion, if you’re playing the first match, you need to have some experienced bowlers including one spinner. So, from the top, my playing 11 would be – Rohit, KL Rahul, number three – Virat (Kohli), number four – Suryakumar Yadav, number five – Deepak Hooda, number six – Hardik Pandya, number seven – Dinesh Karthik, number eight will be a right arm leg spinner so it would be (Yuzvendra) Chahal, 9 to 11, here there will be Jasprit Bumrah, Harshal Patel and along with that you can go for Bhuvneshwar Kumar."

“So, there will be a combination here, three fast bowlers out of which two are quality fast bowlers, who will be able to bowl at the death as well. And I will make sure that I have the combination and the liberty to choose from the three fast bowlers, even Arshdeep (Singh) to handle the death bowling."

“So, in my opinion, in the playing 11, the spinner is clear, it’s just whether I can make space for Arshdeep in the team."

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