Dinesh Karthik Expresses Concerns On India's Batting, Questions Shubman Gill's Place In Playing XI

Ahead of the Cape Town Test, former Indian cricketer Dinesh Karthik expressed his views on Team India's recent performance against South Africa. Karthik highlighted some weak areas where the team struggled to perform well, resulting in a heartbreaking defeat. Former Indian wicket keeper-batsman, who played a heroic in the 2018 Nidhas Trophy Final against Bangladesh, examined Team India's last test batting performance during a chat show with Cricbuzz.

Karthik raised concerns about the team's lack of confidence and continuous failures in SENA countries (South Africa, England, New Zealand, and Australia). In his view, a big reason for the team's bad performance was the failure of the openers. Put a question mark on Shubman Gill's place in the team, Karthik said Gill has not performed up to expectations. Underlining the opener's performance in the last match that India lost to Proteas by an inning and 32 runs, Karthik said Gill only managed to collect 2 and 26 runs in his last two outings, which is not how you expect an inning to start.

Putting his spot in the test playing XI, Karthik added that many people have been knocking team's doors, mentioning Rajat Patidar and Sarfraz Khan's names.

"Shubman Gill is the big question mark here. He has not lived up to the expectations that people have. I think even he would be aware that if you are going to average mid-30s or early-30s after having played 20 Tests, then you would consider yourself to be a bit lucky to be around. His place will definitely be under the scanner if he doesn't have a great Test match in the next one," Karthik said to Cricbuzz.

"The only middle-order name that we are missing out on is Sarfaraz Khan. I have no doubt that he will make it to the squad much sooner than he thinks right now. Other than that, you do not have any other names doing the round in the middle order right now. Rajat Patidar is a very, very strong name that I think they will be looking at very soon," Karthik said highlighting domestic players' heroics and how they are prepared to replace big names.