India T20 World Cup squad: Selectors shun experiment for expected team; focus now on best playing XI

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) finally announced the Men in Blue squad for the T20 World Cup on Monday evening (making Monday Blues more literal) after a long wait for the fans.

If the squad selected suggests one thing, it is that the team management has stopped its experiment for the time being, with the most eligible players selected for the multinational event starting in a month’s time. The Twitterati not creating a furore after the announcement was evidence of the fact.

what’s the point of a selection that doesn’t cause a Twitter meltdown?

— Gaurav Kalra (@gauravkalra75) September 12, 2022

While the 2021 World Cup squad announcement raised multiple eyebrows and witnessed a bloodshed-like situation on Twitter with the team dropping some noteworthy contributors and making wayward selections, the 2022 selection seems a lot more sensible. The selectors, like everyone else, only grew with time.

2022 vs 2021: A look at the changes in India’s squads since 2021 edition

The majority of the batters select themselves going into the World Cup, except for the likes of Deepak Hooda who will have to prove himself in the six preparatory T20Is India plays against Australia and South Africa, and Rishabh Pant who has been trusted in spite of consistent failures.

The bowling unit, which seemed malfunctioning at the Asia Cup as they failed to perform as a pack except in the starting match against Pakistan, as well looks robust and more poised with the comeback of Jasprit Bumrah and Harshal Patel,

Considering that the Indian cricketing matters cannot go without velitations, we can question why Shreyas Iyer and Mohammad Shami were only kept as standby players and not drafted into the main squad.

Suryakumar Yadav despite being inconsistent has proved better than his rival Iyer in patches and hence was bound to be selected ahead of him. And Deepak Hooda’s part-time spin prowess gave him an edge over Iyer. Notably, Iyer has not been given an opportunity even against Australia or South Africa either.

But, Rohit Sharma will want Suryakumar to be more consistent and possibly give more scores of the 30s and 40s rather than one blistering inning combined with multiple scores of 10s and 20s on either side.

Arshdeep Singh, on the other hand, has been drafted into the squad and might play a few of the home games. But was it the right time to consider Arshdeep ahead of Shami? Is there something Arshdeep can do, but Shami can’t?

The questions will remain unanswered, for a while at least. Probably, the selectors are social media addict and thought that vibes are equally important.

No surprises at all in the Indian team for the T20 World Cup. Any of us could have picked it and I believe that is a good thing because it shows there is faith in the players playing so far.

— Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) September 12, 2022

Having said that the squad is largely selected on expected lines, the playing XI combination will have a significant impact at the World Cup. The experiment cannot begin an hour before the toss now and the management will have to be careful about it.

India have made Dinesh Karthik’s “dream come true,” but cannot let him warm the bench as the Asia Cup already highlighted a lack of much-needed impetus in death overs. India, longing for a left-handed batter, prioritised Pant in the continental tournament but the ploy severely failed as Pant couldn’t make an impact and on one occasion, got out trying to be a right-hander.

Dreams do come true