'I’d have him in at that five or six slot' - Ricky Ponting backs Dinesh Karthik as India's finisher for T20 WC 2022

Former Australian captain Ricky Ponting is the latest addition to a long list of former cricketers to lavish praises on veteran Dinesh Karthik. The wicketkeeper-batter earned a recall to the national team after an impressive outing in IPL 2022 and is part of the Indian T20I team in the ongoing series against South Africa.

Karthik, who was seemingly out of the picture for the national side, reinvented his game drastically in the recently concluded IPL 2022 as he donned the role of a finisher for Royal Challengers Bangalore. The wicketkeeper-batter was one of the highlight performers of the season in a star-studded batting line-up. The diminutive right-hander finished the season with 330 runs to his name, with an outstanding strike rate of 183.

Ponting was gushing over the job that the right-hander did for his side coming in the latter stages of the innings and believes that he has to be a part of the Indian squad for the T20 World Cup in Australia later this year.

“I would have him, and I’d have him in at that five or six roles. The way that he finished games for RCB this year, he took his game to another level. When you look at the IPL, you want your better players to maybe be able to win two or three, maybe four games through the season. If you can get that out of them, it’s probably going to be a really good return,” Ponting revealed in a chat with Isa Guha on The ICC Review.

Dinesh Karthik probably had a bigger impact than most of the other RCB players: Ricky Ponting

The emergence of Rajat Patidar in the middle order and the pyrotechnics of Karthik in the death overs propelled RCB to the playoffs of IPL 2022. Even with the contributions of skipper Faf du Plessis and all-rounder Glenn Maxwell, Ponting believes that the 37-year-old outperformed all those batters with his impactful cameos.

“But Dinesh probably had a bigger impact on a lot of the games than most of the other RCB players did this year. Maxi (Glenn Maxwell) started the tournament really well but DK was the one. And Faf too I guess, who kept the RCB bandwagon rolling. I’d be surprised if he’s not in their (India) line-up somewhere,” the three-time World Cup winner added.