Rishabh Pant has played five innings in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy and not crossed the 40-run mark so far. That particular stat tells you everything you need to know about how India’s maverick wicketkeeper-batter has been kept relatively quiet by Australia’s fast bowlers. The silver lining amid the doom and gloom is that Pant passed the 20-run mark in three of those five innings but couldn’t convert them into scores of substance.
It almost seems like Australia have burnt some midnight oil to pore through old videos of Pant and work out a plan. Incidentally, the Australian skipper Pat Cummins had said to Star Sports before the start of the series: “He is someone who has had a big influence on a couple of series. Got to try to keep him quiet.”
The strategy of the Australian set-up is to force Pant to play straighter, with the fast bowlers aiming to angle it across the left-hand batter. Pant has a tendency to dangle his bat ahead of the front pad, and that has caused him some issues against the aforementioned angle. Cummins and Mitchell Starc, from their respective over-the-wicket angles, have implemented that template to near-perfection.
Other teams have also tried the same template with some success. So, by now, Pant would know about opposition teams’ tactics. In the first innings at the Gabba, he even tried to play slightly inside the line. However, he still ended up edging a wobble-seam delivery that forced him to make the fatal mistake.
It is imperative from the Indian team’s perspective that Pant finds a way out of the quagmire that he currently finds himself in. For starters, he is playing in a side where most of the main batters are struggling with form, including the senior pros, Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.
Pant is also the X-factor of the side. He doesn’t just score runs, but he can also break the spirit of the opposition camp. Pant’s efforts in Cape Town, Brisbane, Sydney and Birmingham are testament to this. Even recently, in the just concluded India-New Zealand Test series, Pant seemed to be the fulcrum of the batting order. His 177-run stand with Sarfaraz Khan in Bengaluru, or his impressive fifties on a turning wicket at the Wankhede, give further credence to the point.
In fact, in the first innings of the Perth Test, Pant looked all set to once more torment the Australian team with his pyrotechnics before he was dismissed by Cummins for 37. Since then, it has been all downhill.
Despite his shortcomings in the series, it is hard to imagine Pant losing his self-belief. At the grand theatre of the MCG, there is a good chance that Pant might skip down the wicket while facing his first or second delivery and collect a boundary. And just like that, all the pieces of his batting puzzle might fall into place. The think-tank and millions of Indian cricket fans would be hoping that happens.