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Legends League Cricket: Yusuf Pathan smashes 80 in India Maharajas win over Asia Lions

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Legends League Cricket: Yusuf Pathan smashes 80 in India Maharajas win over Asia Lions

Former Indian all-rounder Yusuf Pathan smashed 80 overs with five sixes and nine fours in the opening match of the Legends Cricket League in Muscat on Thursday (Jan 20), with just 40 balls lifted the Indian Maharaja to 6 wickets over the Asian Lions. Chase 176 to win, substitute captain Mohammed Kaif is unbeaten on 42 in 37 balls (5×4), while Irfan Pathan is unbeaten with 21 in 10 (2×4, 1×6), with 5 in reserve.

Batting first, the Lions were 175/7 in 20 overs, with former Sri Lanka opener Upul Tharanga scoring 66 of 46 balls (7×4, 2×6) while captain Misbah-ul-Haq 44 30s with 4 sixes and 1 four. Former Pakistan wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal was another important scorer with 25 of 17 balls. For the Maharaja, Manpreet Gony was 3/45, while Irfan Pathan was 2/22 in four overs. In the chase, Kaif’s side lost early to Stuart Binny (10) and Subramanium Badrinath (0), but Yusuf’s whirlwind 117 runs with his captain helped his side win easily.

Rohit Sharma should be Test captain, the era of Rishabh Pant will come: Kevin Pietersen
Vice-captain KL Rahul is leading India in the ongoing ODI series in South Africa with Rohit Sharma injured. Former England captain Kevin Peterson has backed Rohit to captain India in all forms.

“I’ve always liked ‘Killer’ Rohit Sharma. He’s a great player and I have to watch every time he hits. His captain is also great for the Mumbai Indians. So he probably is next,” Peterson said.

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Recently, legend Sunil Gavaskar backed young Rishabh Pant to captain India, but Pietersen said it would be the wicket-taker’s turn one day. “You’re spoiled…but Pant isn’t yet, maybe one day…but when you get Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul, you get some strong cricketers.”

The Briton, who is part of the world giants, will face the Asian Lions in the Legends Cricket League in Muscat on Friday (January 21). “Trust me, when you cross the white line, you want to play well. We are all looking forward to it. The first edition will be a difficult one, purely because of lack of time, but when the second season happens in September , guys will be better prepared. It’s our responsibility to develop the game here,” he concluded.

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KL Rahul dangerously close to Laxman territory; to be perished for Sarfaraz Khan and Shubman Gill

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KL Rahul dangerously close to Laxman territory; to be perished for Sarfaraz Khan and Shubman Gill

To accommodate both Sarfaraz and Gill and stick with their five-bowler formula, a batter from the Bengaluru Test must make way. Ergo Rahul and the predicted axe

VVS Laxman went through the first half of his illustrious 15-and-a-half-year international career with the proverbial axe hanging over him. Despite his magical stroke-play and a well-founded reputation for rallying the lower order to bat above itself, he was forever the first name that sprang to the decision-makers’ minds when they had to drop someone to accommodate someone else. It wasn’t until the second half of his stint with the national team that he had ‘job security’, which automatically manifested itself in an array of glorious, match-turning knocks and earmarked him as one for a crisis.

KL Rahul is now dangerously close to approaching the Laxman territory, though at least in this instance, a case can be made out, perhaps, for why he often seems to be playing for his place. Almost a decade after his Test debut in Australia in December 2014, he has yet to nail down a permanent spot, a result of glaring inconsistency and repeated dalliances with injuries that have left him with a modest average of 33.87 from 53 Test appearances.

Unlike Laxman, who was thrust to the opener’s position for three years from 1997, successive team managements have worked overtime to create space for Rahul. He started off in the middle order in Melbourne against Australia, opened in the next Test in Sydney when he made a sparkling century, continued in that position for a good nine years – around the large pockets when either injuries or lack of form relegated him to the sidelines – and now seems to have found his calling in the middle order, where he was tried out in an almost last throw of the dice in South Africa last December.

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In his limited time at the No. 6 position, Rahul has been a revelation. On a spiteful surface in Centurion in his first innings back in the middle order, the classy right-hander made a marvellous 101 – Virat Kohli’s 38 was the next highest score – in India’s 245 all out. Two Tests later, against England in Hyderabad, he waltzed to 86 of the best until a hamstring strain kept him out of the last four Tests.

On his comeback last month against Bangladesh, Rahul showed why he is rated so highly, and therefore why he so frustrates when he chooses to shackle himself mentally, with uninhibited shot-making when India were pressing for a declaration (Chennai) and looking to make up for lost time with a frenetic batting approach (Kanpur) in the two Tests. Kanpur was especially mesmeric, 68 flowing off his bat in a mere 43 deliveries. It was the best of Rahul.

Axe hangs over Rahul’s head for India vs New Zealand 2nd Test

And yet here we are, two innings later, wondering whether he will, or should, feature in the playing XI in Pune, where India take on New Zealand in a must-win second Test from Thursday.

Shubman Gill, him of three centuries in his last six Tests, missed the Bengaluru defeat to the Kiwis with a stiff neck. Replacement batter Sarfaraz Khan made the most of own good fortune with a delectable 150, which makes it near impossible to drop him now that Gill is fully fit. To accommodate both Sarfaraz and Gill and stick with their five-bowler formula which has worked beautifully in the last few years, a batter from the Bengaluru Test must make way. Ergo Rahul and the predicted axe.

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One of the few men to have led India in all three formats internationally, Rahul didn’t help his cause with scores of 0 and 12 at his home ground, the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. In the first innings, he was strangled down leg-side by William O’Rourke while in the second, he received a peach from the same paceman operating with the second new ball and was again caught behind. Rahul was one of 11 failures in India’s first-innings 46 and one of seven wickets to fall in 93 deliveries to the second new cherry, but failures past and the logjam created by Gill’s availability have combined to identify him as the most susceptible to the axe.

It’s a cross impossible to bear, but also impossible to ignore just because it is so heavy, so overarching. Rahul is beyond gifted and makes batting appear oh-so-simple, but his struggles to embrace sustained run-making can’t be wished away. He is the eternal team man, much like his celebrated namesake also from Karnataka – both kept wickets admirably in 50-over World Cups 21 years apart, both made attractive and impactful runs during the tournament and both tasted bitter defeat at the hands of Australia in the final – but ‘eternal team man’ can sometimes be an euphemism for the ‘most dispensable’ and Rahul can be excused for thinking that those two lines have blurred beyond repair. Of course, if he is brutally honest to himself, he will acknowledge at least to himself that he too must bear culpability for the blurring of the lines.

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