I would probably want Ravindra Jadeja to bat at number five: Gautam Gambhir

The bowling all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja is in red-hot form with the willow in the ongoing Australian tour of India. The Saurashtra-born scored a lot of runs in the ODI series including a 50-ball 66 and stitched a crucial 150-run partnership with Hardik Pandya to take India to victory in the third ODI. Jadeja’s brilliant run continued in T20I too as he smashed 44 runs off 23 deliveries in the first T20I against Australia to help India post a competitive total of 161 on the board.

Seeing Jadeja’s exploits with the bat, veteran opening batsman Gautam Gambhir has opined that the all-rounder should be included in the squad as a specialist batsman. Gambhir believes that playing Jadeja at number 5 will help Virat Kohli in playing another all-rounder at number 7 and will provide more stability to the batting line-up.

“I would probably want him to bat at number five because then you can have KL Rahul bat at number four, Virat Kohli at number three and then Jadeja at five, Pandya at six, and you can have another all-rounder at number seven. Use his form. My point has always been very simple. If you make someone bat at number seven, he will bat like a number seven. If you make him bat like a number four or five, he will bat like it and that is how it has always been with everyone,” Gambhir told ESPN Cricinfo.

Gautam Gambhir showers praise on Ravindra Jadeja

The former opener further added that Jadeja has an ability to bat at any position in the batting line-up and he has proved his mettle as a batsman in both red-ball and white-ball cricket. This will allow the Indian team to play with a bowling all-rounder like Krunal Pandya and Axar Patel who can chip in with overs and take wickets.

“You ask someone to open the batting and he starts thinking like an opener. Jadeja has got the ability. We all know that he has got the ability, he has a Test hundred, got runs in all conditions in white-ball cricket and why not push him at number five and see whether we can work with the combination because you open up one spot you can play a number six bowler who can chip in with overs. You can play another left-arm spinner like Krunal Pandya or Axar Patel,” the cricketer-turned-politician added