Shubman Gill has been guilty of taking too much load on himself since his T20 comeback, and the Indian team wants him to bat as freely as he does in the IPL, said assistant coach Ryan ten Doeschate. Gill was brought back into the T20 setup with the Asia Cup in September after he led India to two famous Test wins in the drawn five-match series in England.
He replaced Sanju Samson at the top of the order, but runs have not flown from his bat, raising questions ahead of the World Cup at home in February-March. Speaking to the media after the loss in the second T20 against South Africa, ten Doeschate said Gill needed to loosen up a bit in the shortest format, and he showed signs of that at the back end of the Australia tour last month.
“Taking on the captaincy the way he did in England and how well he led and how much pride he took in that performance, I think an element of that carried over into what he wanted to do in the T20 side,” said the assistant coach in response to a PTI query. “So if anything, he was too caring and maybe a little bit too tight. As I said, towards the back end of Australia, the talks were around freeing up a little bit more, trying to relinquish that responsibility, certainly in that capacity where you feel like it is all about you and you really need to justify your place in the team.
“We don’t want him to do that. We want him to play as freely as he does during IPL seasons. We believe in his class and we believe he will come good, and the same with Surya (captain too has had an extended lean run),” said ten Doeschate. The former Netherlands all-rounder also backed Suryakumar, who has not been able to find consistency since taking over as captain last year.
“Surya again is of such quality, and we have high expectations of the players. If you are going to be India’s number three, there is pressure on you to score runs. “There has been a fairly long string of form now where he hasn’t got the scores we like. But in isolation, we are certainly not worried about it. Batting at three again, the job we want from him is to go out there and attack.
“Again, he is someone I also thought had a lightbulb moment in Australia. I thought he had been batting really nicely leading into this series as well. As I said, two games we are not worried about, and we are confident that he will come well,” said ten Doeschate. We had a poor night with the ball India conceded 213 runs in good batting conditions, with the pace duo of Arshdeep Singh and Jasprit Bumrah having an off day, leaking 54 and 45 runs in their four overs, respectively.
