10 Indian players who opened the batting as a jugaad

5. Parthiv Patel

He came out to open for the first time during India’s disastrous tour of New Zealand in 2002. Team India was struggling as a batting unit and they were desperate to find some runs on the board. One such desperate move was the promotion of Parthiv. It lasted just four balls and he didn’t turn out at the top for the next couple of years.

He has been used as the opener here and there and has had quite a bit of success as well. 3 of his 6 fifties are at the top and Patel averages an enviable 53 when opening the innings. However, the emergence of MS Dhoni and India’s habit of playing around with Dinesh Karthik meant that Parthiv never had a decent run, neither at the top nor in the eleven.

6. Dinesh Karthik

After having batted at number 7 for a good 10 matches, Karthik was sent out to open in Cape Town to shield an out of form Sehwag on what looked like a difficult wicket. He showed great application and got a valuable fifty. He was given some more opportunities and got good success as well. In fact, he has much better numbers at the top, an average of 40.85 with one 100 and five 50s, compared to his overall average of 25 with just two 50s when he is not opening.

However, in the presence of Dhoni, it was very difficult for Karthik to get a long run in the eleven as somehow, the Indian think-tank has never been confident of the Tamil Nadi keeper and Parthiv finding a place in the Test side purely as batsmen. And after Dhoni’s retirement, India fiddled around with Wriddhiman Saha, Karthik and Parthiv as wicketkeepers. Now, of course, Rishabh Pant has joined the bandwagon.