India head coach Rahul Dravid has backed Ishan Kishan despite his poor outing in the recent T20I series against West Indies. The left-hander struggled to get going in the 3-match series as he scored just 71 runs with a strike rate of 85.54.
However, India beat the visitors comprehensively with a 3-0 margin. In the series, India tried lots of youngsters as they handed the international debuts to Ravi Bishnoi and Avesh Khan.
Though the talking point of the series was Ishan Kishan’s performance. Notable that the 23-year old grabbed a deal of 15.25 Crores in the IPL auction as his old franchise Mumbai Indians bought him back but his on-field performance couldn’t back it up. But coach Dravid backed him to come back stronger as he said that the youngster has been picked on potential and few failures don’t make him a bad player overnight.
“This is a tough format. We are asking them to play high-risk cricket. We’re asking them to play shots all the time. And we don’t judge them on a few games. It’s not the way, it’s done. We try to give people as much as possible consistent runs. We’re trying to give them opportunities to play and not judge them on a game-to-game basis or on one series,” said Rahul Dravid.
“Ishan Kishan has been picked on his potential”- Rahul Dravid
Ishan Kishan is the only Indian batter to score a fifty on his T20I and ODI debut.
“Ishan has been picked on his potential, his performance. Yes, you cannot specify this many games. Sometimes it’s combination, sometimes it’s injuries,” Dravid added.
In the last match, Ruturaj Gaikwad was given a chance to open the innings with Ishan Kishan as skipper Rohit Sharma demoted himself down the order. Dravid said that all the youngsters will get handful of matches before making any judgment on them.
“Never always give a player the same number of games, there cannot be a written number in stone whether it’s seven or six matches. Whether it’s Ruturaj Gaikwad or Avesh Khan today. We are not judging them on one game.
“They’re here because they perform and deserve to be here. We like to give the players confidence in the group in and around the squad and that they are not going to be judged on one game. It’s always a tricky balance. But in the larger group, I’m not concerned about one-off series. In this format, it’s going to happen,” Dravid further added.
India’s next white-ball assignment will be the T20I series against Sri Lanka starting on February 24.
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