Shubman Gill’s promise reinforced with maiden ODI hundred

Not part of India’s T20 plans, but the top-order batter has established himself in both the longer formats for the national team

Shubman Gill doesn’t feature in India’s T20I plans, neither for the Asia Cup nor the World Cup in Australia this year. He is yet to play a T20I for India, and with an overall IPL strike rate of 125, it remains to be seen when and how he becomes part of the churn at a time anchor-style batting is not exactly in vogue. (Gill though scored 483 runs at a strike rate of 132.33 last season for IPL champions Gujarat Titans.) Bring up Tests or ODIs though and you can’t ignore Gill. He has rarely put a foot wrong, or mistimed a stroke for that matter. It’s this clarity of thought that strengthens the belief that India have in waiting an opener customised for at least two formats.

Shubman Gill celebrates after scoring a century during the third ODI between Zimbabwe and India at the at the Harare Sports Club

Gill’s initial returns have been overwhelmingly positive. In Tests, he averages 30.47 and has often been found wanting against the moving ball outside off-stump. But also stamping his class was that authoritative 91 in the famous win at the Gabba. Where Gill has really come into his own is the one-day format, averaging 71.28 in just nine matches, bagging consecutive Player of the Series awards in the West Indies, and now in Zimbabwe. Along the way, he notched up scores of 9, 7, 33, 64, 43, 98*, 82* and 33 before finally reaching a maiden hundred in Harare on Monday (130 off 97 balls). A maiden hundred at the age of 22 is usually considered the benchmark of an emerging talent, but Gill been around long enough that it won’t be an exaggeration to say he might have been late to the party.

There is no denying, however, the talent or temperament of Gill, as someone who knows how to convert starts. Shikhar Dhawan pointed that out during the West Indies tour last month. "He has got a very good technique and he is a classy player,” he said about Gill. “You can see that the touch he's got…I think he has got a bit of Rohit (Sharma) touch in him. He has a lot of time. Good to see that he has scored 98 today. He knew how to convert his fifty to 90s.”

While the opposition bowling hasn’t always been top class, quite a few India batters have had separate issues in the Caribbean and Zimbabwe. Not Gill. His has been a template of steady batting, finding boundaries and rotating the strike in the middle overs. Also deploying a wide range of strokes, and never letting the bowler settle. “The way he plays, ones and twos keep coming,” Axar Patel said of Gill at Monday’s post-match media conference.

“He doesn't play many dot balls. That is his biggest positive. He keeps taking ones and twos and then converts the bad balls into boundaries. He plays spin very well. When there are five fielders in the circle in the middle overs, he uses sweep and reverse-sweep well to keep getting boundaries,” he said.

“I was just trying to minimise the dot-ball percentage,” Gill said after Monday’s win. “If you look at my innings, I didn't try to hit the ball. I just tried to time and tried to pick the gaps as much as possible.” In curbing the risk by sticking to ground shots—he did hit one six—Gill has championed a conservative but tried and tested batting technique perfect for one-dayers. It may not have allowed Gill to bat full throttle in T20s, but a 105.27 strike rate is just about the right tempo in 50-overs cricket.

India’s top-order is complicated. Rohit Sharma-KL Rahul, Sharma-Dhawan and Sharma-Rahul seem to be India’s first-choice opening pairs in Tests, ODIs and T20Is as of now. (Gill batted at No 3 in the last two ODIs in Zimbabwe after opening with Dhawan, ahead of Rahul, in the first game). But if India are not too hung up on a left-right ODI pair in the future, Gill could quickly move up the ranks. Monday’s hundred thus was just the right credential Gill needed to facilitate that shift in thought.