‘Sending Ravindra Jadeja up the order was a good move’ – Asghar Afghan praises India’s middle-order strength

Former Afghanistan skipper Asghar Afghan congratulated Team India on their 2022 Asia Cup win over Pakistan on Sunday. He also pointed out that India’s middle-order strength was a clear difference between the two teams at the Dubai International Stadium. India managed to beat their arch-rivals by five wickets in a last-over thriller.

India won the toss and decided to bowl first on a tricky wicket. Indian pacers dominated the first innings with Bhuvneshwar Kumar taking four wickets and Hardik Pandya grabbing three. Star opening batter Mohammad Rizwan smashed the highest 43 runs but the middle order struggled to contribute big as they stumbled out on 147 runs. India lost their opening batters KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma without much of a contribution but their middle order managed to reach the target with two balls remaining. Virat Kohli and Ravindra Jadeja scored 35 runs each and Hardik remained unbeaten on 33 runs to earn a narrow but important win.

Asghar highlighted the weakness in Pakistan’s batting lineup during his discussion on BatBricks7 Presents Run Ki Runneeti show on CricTracker on Tuesday. He compared India's middle-order performance with Pakistan’s and highlighted Kohli’s impressive knock under pressure.

Sending Ravindra Jadeja up was a plus point for India: Asghar Afghan

India lost their skipper Rohit Sharma with just 50 runs on the scoreboard in eight overs. The Indian management surprised everyone when Jadeja came out at the number four position ahead of the likes of Suryakumar Yadav and Hardik Pandya. The intention of playing more aggressive might be the reason from the management. But India lost settled batter Kohli in the next over and first time in the match Pakistan were ahead of their rivals.

But Jadeja, along with Hardik, played some sensible but attacking cricket to turn the match around. Jadeja smashed 35 runs off 29 balls and was bowled out in the last over by Mohammad Nawaz. But he had already managed to guide India to inch closer to a win and this decision to send Jadeja up the order impressed Asghar. He said that this was a big plus point that helped India win the match.

“I already believed in India’s middle-order strength compared to Pakistan’s. India played really well with Kohli performing nicely under the pressure. But India’s plus point was sending Jadeja up the order which helped them win the match,” said Asghar.