India v South Africa: Indian batting exposed

Bengaluru: India v South Africa 3rd T20I, Indian batting line up once again being exposed. India with the experiments before the upcoming World T20 next year are trying various combinations. On the contrary South Africa outplayed India in the last T20I of the 3 match series to level the series 1-1.

India v South Africa: T20I series leveled 1-1.

Ahead of the first game of the three-match T20I series against South Africa, Indian cricket captain Virat Kohli defended the team selection, which focuses on strengthening the lower batting order. He made these remarks in a press conference on Saturday. While the first game was washed out at the Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association ground in Dharamshala, India went on to win at Mohali. But Team India put up a poor performance at Bengaluru.

On being questioned about the inclusion of many players who could bat, he backed the decision by pointing out the fact that teams across the world had a batting line-up till number 9 or 10. Kohli mentioned that the selectors had to take a call on the inclusion of certain players at some juncture. Stating that the World T20  was scheduled for next year, the Indian skipper reckoned that this would be an excellent opportunity to check how the players performed at the international level. 

Rather it still appears Indian batting depends on Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan and Virat Kohli(Top 3) entirely. It was pretty evident in the 3rd T20I against South Africa, once the top 3 failed Indian batting fell like a pack of cards. After deciding to bat first India managed to score just 134 runs, defending 134 at M.Chinnaswamy was always going to be difficult with short boundaries and the way the ball travels at the venue. South Africa chased the score with 9 wickets remaining.

Also read:  Virat Kohli breaching ICC Code of Conduct

India's Top 3 contributes more than 60% of the runs scored

From such performances it seems like India need to bat sensibly rather than batting deep till 9-10. Indian batting has been over depended on the Top 3, the same problem that saw India's shocking World Cup exit.

All eyes were be on Rishabh Pant who could well be at the end of the long rope the team management has afforded him but he failed to deliver again, scoring just 19 off 20 balls.

The batting vows have been a problem for India for years now. The questions over India's batting issues still remains unanswered.