Ishan Kishan's T20I struggle in last 8 months highlighted by out-of-favour India batter
Ishan might be backed for the final T20I match against New Zealand on Wednesday at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, but his continued struggle in white-ball format has been keenly tracked by his competitors, in or outside the present Indian side.
Ishan Kishan and his thunderous 131-ball 210 was everything world cricket could talk about last month when he had notched up that double century knock in Chattogram against Bangladesh. India legend Sunil Gavaskar had even gone to the extent of admitting that with that kind of batting a 300 in ODIs looks absolutely plausible while even backing the youngster for it. But Ishan has since been struggling in white-ball cricket. In eight appearances for India since that majestic knock, five in T20Is and three in ODIs, Ishan has managed only 93 runs in 120 balls, with five single-digit scores.
Ishan might be backed for the final T20I match against New Zealand on Wednesday at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, but his continued struggle in white-ball format has been keenly tracked by his competitors, in or outside the present Indian side.
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One of those competitors is Nitish Rana, another left-handed top-order batter who is also a part-time off-spinner. On the back of an impressive 2021 IPL season, where he had scored 383 runs with two half-centuries, Rana was given a call-up for India's tour of Sri Lanka. He made both his ODI and T20I debut in the tour. He played one ODI match, scoring seven runs, and two T20Is, scoring 15 runs, before being dropped from the side and never called back. But as he awaits his opportunity, he highlighted Ishan's struggle in T20I cricket by liking a Twitter post on it.
The post showed that since June last year the Mumbai Indians star scored only 199 runs at 15.30 and at a strike rate of 106.41. It includes five single-digit scores and no half-centuries.
Talking about Rana, he has been eyeing a comeback as admitted in his interview with Sportstar in October last year. “Back of my mind there is always this aim to make an India comeback as the Sri Lanka series didn’t go well for me personally and I am ready whenever the chance comes,” Rana had said.
