Veteran Indian cricketer Dinesh Karthik has backed young uncapped Indian spin sensation Ravi Bishnoi to challenge senior leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal for a spot in the ODI squad, opining that the latter, despite his recent struggle in limited-overs cricket, has gone unchallenged due to lack of wrist spinning options.
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In the period before the 2019 ODI World Cup, Chahal had picked 78 wickets in 53 ODI matches for India at 24.19 and a strike rate of 29.3. Following the mega event, Chahal's performance took a nosedive, with the spinner now averaging a dismal 35.64 in picking 14 wickets in nine matches with a strike rate of 36.8. Even in the recent series, against South Africa, Chahal had picked only two wickets for 147 runs in three ODI matches.
Karthik, in conversation with Cricbuzz, opined that Chahal has been lucky owing to lack of wrist-spin challenges coming through the ranks. He feels that besides Chahal, India presently have two other leg-spin options in Rahul Chahar and Bishnoi. While Chahar is yet to make a comeback after the T20 World Cup last year, Bishnoi has been picked for the West Indies series which will begin at home starting February 6.
“At this point of time, outside of Chahal, if you got to pick a wrist-spinner, then there is Rahul Chahar and Ravi Bishnoi. And looking at the way things have panned out, I do feel Bishnoi is ahead at the moment right now. But we need to see how badly is Chahal bowling. His stats say that he hasn't had the best of years. But in many ways he has been lucky because there is nobody pushing him for a place in the squad,” said Karthik.
{{/usCountry}}“At this point of time, outside of Chahal, if you got to pick a wrist-spinner, then there is Rahul Chahar and Ravi Bishnoi. And looking at the way things have panned out, I do feel Bishnoi is ahead at the moment right now. But we need to see how badly is Chahal bowling. His stats say that he hasn't had the best of years. But in many ways he has been lucky because there is nobody pushing him for a place in the squad,” said Karthik.
{{/usCountry}}The 36-year-old feels that lack of domestic cricket in the last two years has been the primary reason behind lack of leg-spinners coming through the ranks, which has left the selectors with only the IPL to look at to judge players.
"So you have to understand that these things happen due to lack of domestic cricket. We are only looking at IPL. There is nothing else to look at in terms of new bowlers, fast bowlers are there in plenty, but when it comes to wrist spinners, there are hardly any.
“And that will remain an issue due to lack of domestic cricket, because you need people with a lot of wickets, especially wrist spinners, and they haven't played the longer format. They play only 4-5 games of Vijay Hazare and that's all you get as a sample to choose from. That is why in the last two years you haven't seen anybody come out from the ranks. And the main reason is of course Covid which has created a havoc for many domestic cricketers. While a lot of the international cricketers want a break, the domestic cricketers want a game right now,” he explained.