Rishabh Pant has every shot in the book and is very tough to bowl to: Rashid Khan

Rashid Khan is one of the best leg-spinners in the world right now. His success with the Sunrisers Hyderabad has made him quite popular with the Indian masses as well. There are many batsmen who will still say that facing Rashid Khan is quite difficult as he has many variations and is a lethal bowler. However, Rashid has revealed that he finds one batsman particularly difficult to bowl to.

The Afghan leg-spinner has faced many batsmen with brute power in the many T20 leagues that he has played in. In a recent interaction with Indian spinner Yuzvendra Chahal, Khan revealed that he finds it difficult to bowl to Rishabh Pant. During the conversation, Khan talked about a U19 tri-series match that happened in 2015. The matches were being played at the Jadavpur University second campus ground right as the preparation of the ICC U19 World Cup in 2016.

He has every shot in the book: Rashid Khan on Rishabh Pant

According to the 21-year-old spinner from Afghanistan, Pant has all shots in the book. “He has every shot in the book and is one batsman who is very tough to bowl to. I remember bowling to him at a ground in Kolkata in the U19 Tri-series,” Rashid said.

Khan described the frustration with which Afghan bowlers were bowling to Pant in that match. “He hit three sixes in a row and in the fourth ball, he mistimed but only to be dropped at short midwicket. Our bowler looked helpless and put his hands on his head, yelling in Pashto, ‘now what do I do get him out?’,” Khan recalled the incident in an Instagram chat with Indian legspinner Yuzvendra Chahal.

Having played in many T20 leagues across the globe, Rashid has the opportunity to bowl to the hard-hitting batsmen from the West Indies. Upon being asked how he goes about planning against them, the young leggie discussed how he plans to bowl to them.

“Never pitch the ball up; they would clear boundaries with ease. It’s about playing them on the backfoot and confuse them with the wrong one and leg-spin. I always try to mix it up,” Rashid said.