T20s might be the most popular format today but the flourishing lifespan of a player, particularly that of a batsman, is quite short. One really hopes that’s not the case with India opener Abhishek Sharma. In the last six T20Is for India, the left-handed batter has come up with a string of lowly scores: 10, 16, 3, 1, 8 and 2.
But it’s not his scores that are alarming — players often go through such phases. It’s the way he has batted. Eerily, he has batted and got out much in the same way right from the outset of India’s overseas white-ball tour. India played two T20Is in Ireland, and he got 49 in one of the matches. Then, in the first two T20Is in England, he contributed 59 and 43.
Thereafter, it has been a huge slide. After the Zimbabwe tour that got over on Sunday night with India winning 3-0 after defeats in the previous two series, things, if truth be told, have gone totally out of hand for the 25-year-old.
It appears he went into these matches with a prior plan. That he is going to move away from the ball and take a swipe, hoping to connect and send it past the backward point or over the covers. In the first few matches against Ireland and England, it worked a bit, although it looked very ugly. And when it stopped working, he had no plan B. The same mode of dismissal — in a manner of speaking — followed right up to the third game against Zimbabwe. Step away, go for a slash, edge, and the wicketkeeper takes the catch, or someone at backward point pouches his tame stroke. That’s how he has got out, largely.
Seems like he is taking the similar route, that of Suryakumar Yadav. But in Surya’s case, at least he slowed down and tried to spend some time in the middle in the latter half of his career — after he lost his fluency following a period of extraordinary success. He had better technique too. As far as Abhishek is concerned, there is no technique to speak of. It’s a very serious issue. Why has he got hasty all of a sudden at the crease? Is he expecting too much of himself? Has the success in the last couple of years made him forget that he can’t survive with just one style of batsmanship? At this rate, he can’t last long in international cricket, where one has to reinvent oneself with every passing series.
Did Vaibhav Sooryavanshi make him insecure?
One can’t help but wonder if Vaibhav Sooryavanshi’s arrival has played a role in Abhishek’s decline. Sooryavanshi came into the team with so much fanfare. People stopped talking about everyone else in the team. Did that make Abhishek insecure? Sooryavanshi also struggled in England, but he has improved since. In the third game against Zimbabwe, the way he batted was quite out of the ordinary. He showed maturity beyond his years. Realising that the pitch wasn’t exactly batting-friendly, he took his time and didn’t rush into his shots. That he took 31 balls for his fifty says a great deal about the kind of approach the 15-year-old adopted. And it shows he has a Plan B at his disposal.
This wasn’t the first time that Abhishek was playing in tricky, overseas conditions, but never before had he looked all at sea like this. The Sunrisers Hyderabad opener hadn’t had a great T20 World Cup either earlier this year. His deterioration started right there, but a record fifty in the final made one look away. But now things have come to a head. India legend Yuvraj Singh has been given a lot of credit in the past for developing Abhishek Sharma’s stroke-making. Maybe now he should try to fix his defence a bit. Joking aside, it’s very serious. The team is losing Abhishek slowly. India’s next T20I game is in October at home against the West Indies, which means there are more than two months for him to fix his issues. Time to put his head down and go back to the drawing board. That’s the only way he can save himself.