Rishabh Pant need to be neat and tidy behind the stumps, feels Kumar Sangakkara

Rishabh Pant’s plight seems to be never-ending. The wicketkeeper-batsman who is often seen to be a natural heir to the legendary Mahendra Singh Dhoni has fumbled with his glovework in the ongoing T20Is against Bangladesh and the supporters are not sparing him. His review calls have been suspect and was found to be less than perfect with his keeping skills in the second match in Rajkot on Thursday.

Former Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara, who excelled both as the batsman and wicket-keeper, has now come up with a piece of advice for the 22-year-old India wicketkeeper to regain his lost confidence after a string of failures. The Lankan legend asked Pant to keep things simple in both batting and keeping and understand his weakness.

“It’s important for him (Pant) to keep things simple and understand his weakness. Once he is able to work on these areas, he needs to strategise and plan, because for him right now he needs to keep things simple and not be under pressure,” the 42-year-old Sangakkara, who has a combined tally of 678 victims in international cricket across all formats, said during the show ‘Cricket Live’ on Star Sports.

‘Someone needs to talk to Pant on his batting’ – Kumar Sangakkara

“It’s also important for someone to talk to him on his batting and keep him off the pressure and let him be free with his game.” Pant’s batting form has also come under scrutiny. Though the cricketer has slammed two international hundreds in Tests so far, he has not been as successful as in the limited-over formats.

Since the World Cup, Pant has scored only one half-century which was against the West Indies and did not get to play in the recent Test series against South Africa at home, which raised questions over his keeping techniques on turning tracks. Earlier this year, Pant faced a massive backlash for having erred with keeping after he was picked for an ODI against Australia at home in the place of Dhoni.

Sangakkara felt Pant needs to be “neat and tidy behind the stumps” after he was found to be failing to do smooth work in the Bangladesh series.

“As a wicketkeeper, it’s important to be neat and tidy behind the stumps which will give him confidence and put him in a better position to help his captain in calling for reviews,” Sangakkara added. Pant made a technical mess in the second game when replays showed his gloves were not behind the stumps when effecting a run-out of Bangladesh batsman Liton Das against the bowling of Yuzvendra Chahal.

Former India batsman VVS Laxman agreed with Sangakkara but said that Pant’s batting has concerns.