Rohit Sharma backs Kedar Jadhav to turn up as the second spinner if needed in the World Cup 2019

Kedar Jadhav had only eight wickets in 162 domestic matches across formats when he made his international debut for India. After playing 54 ODIs, he has better economy than most of the specialist spinners and his off-spinners have helped Jadhav pick 25 wickets as well. During the fifth ODI against New Zealand in Wellington, he was the second spinner for the Men in Blue and the wily spinner didn’t disappoint again due to which the stand-in captain Rohit Sharma is chuffed.

Jadhav bowled seven overs and conceded only 34 runs while also picking the opposition skipper Kane Williamson’s wicket at a crucial point. Once again, the lack of pace bluffed the batsman and the part-timer had the last laugh against his favourite opponent, New Zealand.

After the game, Rohit Sharma conceded that he looks at Kedar Jadhav as the proper spinner who might have to play the role of the second spinner in the World Cup if needed.

Anything can happen in World Cup with injuries

“In the World Cup you’re going to play nine games. Semifinal, final, that’s 11 games. Anything can happen to anyone – injuries, out of form. Keeping those things in mind we wanted to try out every combination that we can have as a team. We tried two spinners, we tried four seamers and one spinner, and then Kedar always gives us the balance of being the second spinner.

“I consider him as a proper spinner because every game, you see, he bowls four-five overs, six overs, seven overs maybe, and gets a wicket as well, at the crucial time. Even today you saw, the wicket of Kane Williamson was a crucial point when he got that wicket, because they were going pretty well at that point, things were looking very easy from a New Zealand perspective,” Rohit said during the post-match press conference.

However, Rohit also clarified that they rested Kuldeep as it was a dead-rubber and also wanted to try out different combinations. “We wanted to try the four seaming options and one spinner, with Kedar being the part-time option there. See, if the series was on the line, we would have played with two spinners, probably three seamers, with Kedar being there, but yes, now that we’ve won the series, after the third game, we wanted to try out various combinations which will help us going forward. So that was the idea,” Sharma further added.

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