A confident KL Rahul is an asset to the Indian side: Rohan Gavaskar

Former Indian cricketer Rohan Gavaskar has talked about Team India's opening batter KL Rahul's form with the bat in the ongoing 2022 T20 Asia Cup. He has also emphasized the fact that Rahul is an asset to the Indian side and should be backed. 

Rohan also talked about Suryakumar Yadav's batting performance and said that the batting order needs to revolve around him if the Men in Blue are looking to win the upcoming 2022 T20 World Cup slated to be played in Australia this year. 

Team management would have asked him to spend some time in the middle: Rohan on KL Rahul 

Speaking exclusively on SPORTS18’s daily sports news show ‘SPORTS OVER THE TOP’, Rohan said, “Look, you know, I think he’s coming back from a long, long injury layoff. He didn’t get too many opportunities in the West Indies (Zimbabwe). And I think if you look at yesterday's innings in isolation and you look at you say, okay listen, 36 off 39 deliveries against Hong Kong seems to be slow. But I think in this case the team management would have said to him, this is a bit of a free hit, you know, you know 999 times out of 1000, you're going to win against Hong Kong."

"So, this was a bit of a free hit, saying KL, take your time out there, get set, get a feel out there being in the middle and then we'll see how it goes. If he continues to bat as he did in yesterday's game, then I think, you know, we might see a bit of a change. But I think yesterday there might have been some suggestion from the team management saying don't worry about strike rate for this particular game. Just worry about spending time in the middle, getting some runs, getting some confidence. Because we all know a confident KL Rahul is an asset to the side,” he added.     

The former Indian cricketer also talked about team India's star batter Suryakumar Yadav who stroked an excellent fifty in team India's last game against Hong Kong. 

“I've been saying this for a while. Listen, if we need to win the World Cup, our batting needs to revolve around SKY. Do we need to ask SKY what is your position? Where do you think you can make the most impact?  Because we've seen him open, we've seen him bat at 3, we've seen him bat at 4. Do you feel that you know you can create the most damage opening the innings? Do you feel you could create the most damage at 3 or 4 and then listen to what he says and give him that free reign? Because again yesterday, everyone was talking about the pitch being a little tough and not so easy to play shorts on and then he comes out and plays the kind of innings that only players with a special ability," said Rohan.

"You know strike rate of over 200. Yesterday he was just phenomenal, and he made sure we had that little bit of push-in against the team by Hong Kong. So, look, as I've said many times before, if we are to progress in the World Cup, Sky is going to be such an influential part in that team and play such an influential role in that team,” he added.