Former Pakistan pacer Mohammad Amir has compared the situation that India opener Abhishek Sharma finds himself in to what Pakistan’s Saim Ayub is experiencing. Abhishek is yet to open his account in this T20 World Cup, getting out for ducks in all three matches that he has played thus far, having missed India’s group match against Namibia due to a severe stomach infection. Amir feels that Abhishek seems to be looking to slog every ball and feels anyone playing like that will always be exposed in international cricket at some point.
“Saim (Ayub) had the same issue when he came to play the PSL a few years back. He was new and was hitting no-look shots. Nobody knew his weakness because most of his shots were on the leg side. Now, if you bowl at the third or fourth stump line, he struggles to decide. Even in his last two matches, he was dismissed playing on the offside. Unless he improves his offside game, he cannot progress. Strong bowlers will always test your weakness and push you out of your comfort zone. Same for Abhishek. He wants every ball in the slot so he can hit. But at the bigger stages, or in ODIs, har ball lapete mein nahi le sakte (you cannot slog every ball in pressure cricket). Salman Agha and Aryna Dutta got him out in a similar fashion. International cricket will expose you,” Amir said while speaking on the show Haarna Mana hai.
Abhishek has a very high-risk style of batting. In the 41 T20Is he has played thus far, Abhishek has made 1297 runs and he still boasts a career strike rate of a whopping 192.43 desite the three failures in this T20 World Cup. Sharma had fallen for a golden duck against USA in India’s opening match at Wankhede Stadium. Sharma tried to play a lofted shot off pacer Ali Khan resulting in his dismissal. The 25-year-old then mistimed a pull shot off the bowling of Pakistan captain Salman Agha in the first over in the much anticipated clash against the arch rivals in Columbo. Sharma again fell on a duck during India’s clash against Netherlands as he missed a pull against off-spinner Aryan Dutt. Post the match against Pakistan, Amir had termed Sharma as a slogger.
“By whatever little I have seen, if you ask me honestly, I feel he is just a slogger. He has to go hard at every ball. The day he gets going, it’s fine; otherwise, uske failure ke chances zyaada hain (The chances of his failure are high). He scores once in 8 innings. Otherwise, his scores are 10, 15, 0, and 20. I don’t think he is technically sound,” Amir had said.
Former Pakistan batsman Basit Ali had turned Amir’s terming of Sharma as a slogger as a compliment. ”If he is a slogger, then give us one like him — ek humey bhi de do! It is good that we get such players,” All had said on his YouTube channel ‘TheBasitAliShow’.
