India has scored two wins in a row against England in their ODI series at home. This series is seen as a warm-up for the upcoming Champions Trophy, starting in less than two weeks. Captain Rohit Sharma has returned to his best form, but one decision by the coaching staff has raised some eyebrows.
In both matches held in Nagpur and Cuttack, India won by four wickets. However, the coach made a surprising choice by sending left-handed batter Axar Patel to bat at No. 5 instead of the more experienced KL Rahul. Fans on social media expressed their confusion, and former cricketer Dodda Ganesh criticized this strategy.
Ganesh took to X (formerly Twitter) to question this decision, saying, “Axar Patel at No. 5 again? I’m shocked. Why would you send a strong batter like KL Rahul to No. 6? If the team has a poor start, would you really feel comfortable sending Axar to bat on a tricky pitch? This experiment makes no sense!”
In the first match, Ganesh had also raised concerns about Rahul being moved down. He tweeted: “KL Rahul performs best at No. 5, yet the team keeps moving him down the batting order. It’s ridiculous. What’s the point of sending Axar to No. 5?”
Regarding their performances, Axar had a good run, scoring 52 runs in Nagpur and 41 not out in Cuttack, and also took a wicket in both games. Meanwhile, KL Rahul, batting at No. 6, only made 12 runs in total. Rahul has batted at this position just two other times in his career, scoring 54 runs overall at an average of 18.
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