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The many doors Hardik Pandya’s arrival opens for India
Hardik Pandya's fitness is crucial for India's T20 success, serving as a versatile middle-order anchor and effective bowler, highlighted in the recent win over South Africa.
Kolkata: Tuesday’s first T20I win over South Africa illustrated once again why Hardik Pandya’s sustained fitness is intrinsically linked to India’s fortunes in white-ball cricket. He is the middle-order anchor who can graft or attack depending on the situation. He can be used as a new-ball bowler on pitches India want to go in with three spinners, few can debate his leadership, and even fewer can argue that he is the crisis man India can always go to when all options seem exhausted.
That wasn’t quite the scenario when Pandya was thrown the ball on Tuesday but so pronounced is David Miller’s hitting range that letting him find his feet is never an option in T20 cricket. Not to forget, Pandya perhaps knows a thing or two more about Miller who was his Gujarat Titans teammate for a considerable phase. Pandya came, bowled length on off-stump and let Miller make a mess of a simple delivery. It’s wickets like these that underscore Pandya’s importance as a bowler in this side.
Batting and bowling roles may be overrated in T20 but what one player brings to the side on paper matters as well. When fit, Pandya has been ticking that box effortlessly, especially in the bowling department, though that barely gets enough attention.
There is a pattern to his bowling where irrespective of the surface he tends to take the pace off the ball and leave the batters unsure. And he hits the good length so consistently that it remains a mystery why he isn’t given the entire quota. Only nine times in 28 innings since 2024 has Pandya bowled four overs, so maybe there is more left to be explored there. Pandya isn’t fussing about it though.
“As a cricketer, I don’t think I have ever been fussy about what roles I have in the game,” Pandya said at the presentation ceremony in Cuttack. “I’ve always been very motivated all the time to make sure that it does not matter what Hardik Pandya wants. It matters what India wants. And whenever I get opportunities, I come and try to do my best.
“Some days are good, some days are not. But at the same point of time, it’s the mindset which helps me. And I think it’s been (the same way) throughout my cricketing career. I’ve always tried to put my team first, the nation first, and whichever team I have played for. I think that’s my biggest USP and that’s what has always helped me.”
It says something about India’s bowling riches that Pandya is rarely required for the full quota of overs. But what he brings to the side as batting anchor -- he hit a 28-ball 59 not out -- is probably unique. Not only can he bat anywhere from No.3 to No.8, Pandya has the rare ability of perfectly pacing his scoring according to the situation.
More pivotal however was how Pandya’s presence allowed Abhishek Sharma and Tilak Varma to go back to their primary role of enforcer, something they have had to modify a bit in the last two months when Pandya couldn’t play due to injury.
When Pandya came to bat, India were struggling to score on a two-paced pitch, but he found the right deliveries to score off. “I had to be a little bit gutsy and it was more about timing the ball and not trying to break the ball,” he said.
A few jailbreak shots were in order and Pandya did just that by hitting Keshav Maharaj for two sixes in his very first over. More impactful though were the sixes he hit off pacers Lutho Sipamla and Anrich Nortje towards the end, propelling India to a par score that seemed near impossible when Pandya had entered the ground with the score reading 78/4.
Not quite two rescue acts given how South Africa’s batting capitulated later in the night, but this is exactly why India can’t do without Pandya in white-ball cricket.
