Suddenly I feel there is something missing in this Indian T20 side. The opening pair of Samson and Abhishek looked good, but the moment they brought in Vaibhav Sooryavanshi by dropping Sanju Samson, it created unnecessary chaos. Dropping your World Cup-winning captain and Player of the Tournament suddenly sends a message to everyone that no place is secure. Instead of playing fearless cricket, players may start thinking, "If I fail in 2-3 games, will I be next?" That isn't the environment you want in a T20 setup. At 3, 4 and 5, Ishan, Iyer and Tilak look fine on paper, but Tilak at No.5 still doesn't convince me. His natural game is to take a few balls before exploding, which suits No.3 much better than No.5, especially in pressure chases. Dube too is being used more as a finisher, whereas his biggest strength is taking down spin from No.4 or No.5; quality pace still troubles him at times. Axar is probably going through the leanest phase of his career, I can't remember a significant knock recently, and even with the ball he isn't at his usual level. Then comes the bowling. Beyond Arshdeep and Harshit, who are your genuinely trusted fast bowlers? Prasidh and Prince are good options but not yet proven enough to be automatic picks, while Varun too isn't having the same wicket-taking impact he had earlier. Individually none of these are massive concerns, but put them all together and somehow the team doesn't feel as settled or intimidating as it should. Hopefully, over the next year, India stop experimenting and start building role clarity and combinations towards the 2028 T20 World Cup.
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