India skipper Virat Kohli said on Friday that he does not see the performances at the upcoming Indian Premier League having any influence on the national selection for ICC World Cup 2019, scheduled to take place in May. After losing the T20I series 2-0, Kohli said on the eve of the first ODI, “I don’t see the IPL having any influence on World Cup selection. I think that will be very, very radical sort of analysis.”
India skipper Virat Kohli said on Friday that he does not see the performances at the upcoming Indian Premier League having any influence on the national selection for ICC World Cup 2019, scheduled to take place in May. After losing the T20I series 2-0, Kohli said on the eve of the first ODI, “I don’t see the IPL having any influence on World Cup selection. I think that will be very, very radical sort of analysis.”
With Dinesh Karthik and Rishabh Pant fighting for the second wicketkeeper’s slot, Kohli said that nothing will change with how the IPL goes for any of the players. “We need to have a solid team. Before we head into the IPL, we need to be absolutely clear of what team we want for the World Cup. I don’t see anything changing on how the IPL goes for any of the players. If one or two players do not have a good IPL season, it doesn’t mean that they are out of the picture for the World Cup. Those things are not going to matter.”
“We will have to think about the combinations. I don’t think playing a bowler less is a good idea because with the extra fielder in till the 40th over, it becomes very difficult to sort of get a few guys to chip in with a few overs here and there,” he added. “We will have to work out the batting combination to try and give game-time to the guys we want to. But, I don’t see the bowling combination changing.”
Praising the in-form KL Rahul, the skipper said, “It augurs really well. KL, when he plays well, is operating at a different level I feel. We have seen him do that in the IPL last year and in patches over the last season we played as a team.”
“It’s very difficult to find a consistent player, who can play good cricketing shots and still win you games at a strike-rate of over 140 or 150. He has all the shots and has a solid game as well. It will be interesting to see what happens in the final World Cup squad. Definitely, he has made a strong case for himself. It’s good he’s in great nick and hopefully he can carry it forward.”
When asked if the team is experimenting at the cost of winning the series, Kohli said, “We are playing to win the series or else I’ll leave the ball to hit the stumps. As I said earlier, if we want to see how a few guys play in a certain situation, we’ll play them again in that situation. It’s not like if a guy is not playing in a certain situation, he doesn’t have the ability.”
“We could not win the T20 series because in the first match, we didn’t play good cricket and in the second match, Australia played better than us. I think it’s important you understand why we lost. From outside, it’s easy to say, they don’t have the heart to play. We always want to win games for India. If we only had to experiment, we would have got out for 50 as everybody would have got out trying to hit sixes,” the skipper added.
“If you see it negatively, you’ll only be able to extract negative things but if you look at it positively, you’ll be able to take positive things,” he concluded.
India play five-match ODI series against Australia, starting from Saturday.
With Dinesh Karthik and Rishabh Pant fighting for the second wicketkeeper’s slot, Kohli said that nothing will change with how the IPL goes for any of the players. “We need to have a solid team. Before we head into the IPL, we need to be absolutely clear of what team we want for the World Cup. I don’t see anything changing on how the IPL goes for any of the players. If one or two players do not have a good IPL season, it doesn’t mean that they are out of the picture for the World Cup. Those things are not going to matter.”
“We will have to think about the combinations. I don’t think playing a bowler less is a good idea because with the extra fielder in till the 40th over, it becomes very difficult to sort of get a few guys to chip in with a few overs here and there,” he added. “We will have to work out the batting combination to try and give game-time to the guys we want to. But, I don’t see the bowling combination changing.”
Praising the in-form KL Rahul, the skipper said, “It augurs really well. KL, when he plays well, is operating at a different level I feel. We have seen him do that in the IPL last year and in patches over the last season we played as a team.”
“It’s very difficult to find a consistent player, who can play good cricketing shots and still win you games at a strike-rate of over 140 or 150. He has all the shots and has a solid game as well. It will be interesting to see what happens in the final World Cup squad. Definitely, he has made a strong case for himself. It’s good he’s in great nick and hopefully he can carry it forward.”
When asked if the team is experimenting at the cost of winning the series, Kohli said, “We are playing to win the series or else I’ll leave the ball to hit the stumps. As I said earlier, if we want to see how a few guys play in a certain situation, we’ll play them again in that situation. It’s not like if a guy is not playing in a certain situation, he doesn’t have the ability.”
“We could not win the T20 series because in the first match, we didn’t play good cricket and in the second match, Australia played better than us. I think it’s important you understand why we lost. From outside, it’s easy to say, they don’t have the heart to play. We always want to win games for India. If we only had to experiment, we would have got out for 50 as everybody would have got out trying to hit sixes,” the skipper added.
“If you see it negatively, you’ll only be able to extract negative things but if you look at it positively, you’ll be able to take positive things,” he concluded.
India play five-match ODI series against Australia, starting from Saturday.