Former Indian cricketer and current India ‘A’ head coach Rahul Dravid has been mentoring young talents to prepare them for Team India. Dravid has a history of not indulging in questions being raised towards current cricketers and selectors. Recently as well, the 45-year-old dodged giving a clarification as to why India ‘A’ players Mayank Agarwal and Prithvi Shaw did not make it to the Indian team. While speaking to Cricbuzz, he said,
“All I will say is, I think they have shown over the last year or so with their performances that they are playing very good cricket. It’s nice to see them developing and growing as players. Whether there is an opportunity or not is not for me to decide. Mayank was quite exceptional in this game and Prithvi has shown continuous improvement in every level he has played.”
Mayank Agarwal and Prithvi Shaw have performed outstandingly in the recent past. Agarwal-Shaw shared an opening partnership of 277 runs for the first wicket which laid the foundation of an easy win at M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru.
Indian batsmen barring skipper Virat Kohli have struggled to score in overseas conditions. India suffered a major batting collapse against English bowling lineup at Edgbaston which barely depicted them as the No.1 ranked Test team in the world.
Agarwal starred in the previous domestic season and made a double century against South Africa ‘A’ while Indian batsmen struggle to perform in England.
Agarwal’s domestic performance has been outstanding, he was the highest scorer in Ranji Trophy 2017-18 with 1,160 runs from 8 matches at an average of 105.45 including 5 centuries and 2 half-centuries. He also scored a triple century in the season but the Karnataka batsman still failed to catch the attention of selectors.
Shaw’s graph has only gone up in the past year. He led India to Under-19 World Cup win. He has 7 centuries and 5 centuries from 13 First-Class matches played. The 18-year-old made South Africa A bowlers toil for wickets and scored 136 runs from 196 deliveries.
The Mumbai batsman is considered as the next big thing of Indian cricket. It wouldn’t hurt to give him a chance at the biggest stage of cricket. In the past, players like Sachin Tendulkar, Anil Kumble have been fast-racked into the Indian team and the results have been extraordinary.
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Indian batsmen were pretty ordinary in the Edgbaston Test which India lost by a narrow margin of 31 runs. If these performance continue, we might see a few major changes in the Indian Test side who have dominated in home conditions but have won just 2 Tests overseas since 2013 barring West Indies.
