Suryakumar Yadav’s last Twenty20 International half-century came more than a year ago, in his seventh game as India’s full-fledged skipper. In 15 subsequent innings, he has topped 20 just three times, been dismissed before reaching 10 on eight occasions and failed to tickle the scorers thrice.
If this doesn’t paint the picture of a captain in strife, nothing else will. For close to two years, the right-hander from Mumbai was the most feared batter in the 20-over game, seemingly possessing more than one stroke to each delivery, taking on the bowling with no compunctions, ‘expressing’ himself with a flair and authority that comes only to a very few. But since then, there has been a dramatic, alarming fall from grace; the 35-year-old is now placed only eighth in the ICC rankings for T20I batters, the top slot he once occupied unchallenged now held by his intrepid young opening colleague, Abhishek Sharma.
As recently as a month back, a couple of hours after leading India to the T20 Asia Cup crown, Suryakumar wished away concerns about his slump. “I am not out of form, I am just out of runs,” the captain insisted. A nice line that, backed up by his assertion that so long as he knew what he was doing and so long as he was following his processes, he didn’t need to worry about the returns.
For all his obvious nonchalance, he must have felt the pinch. In the T20 firmament, he was succeeding Rohit Sharma, the tone-setter whose aggressive starts in the PowerPlay often decided matches in their infancy. Rohit was a wonderful role model in that he didn’t ask of his teammates what he wouldn’t do himself. Once he identified a no-holds-barred approach as the way to go in both limited-overs configurations, he took it upon himself to translate into deeds the words he had espoused in the changing room. The assiduous accumulator of the past, him with three ODI double-hundreds, gave way to an ultra-attacking batter who thought little of taking calculated risks with the field restrictions in place.
Because the leader put his money where his mouth was, the rest needed no goading to fall in line. Suryakumar himself was one of the prime beneficiaries of the backing and the support of the management group, which was happy to overlook failures in the pursuit of adhering to team plans.
Having inherited (some might say unexpectedly) a World Cup-winning unit from Rohit, who retired from T20Is immediately after receiving the trophy in Bridgetown in June last year, Suryakumar’s brief was clear – to carry that brand of play forward while infusing his own ideologies, in conjunction with new head coach Gautam Gambhir. Unlike the 50-over World Cup which comes around every four years, its younger and shorter sibling is a biennial event, so the plans for the next extravaganza had to be worked out post-haste. Adding to the drama was the fact that the tournament would be staged in India (mainly) and Sri Lanka, which means India will be tasked with defending the crown in their own backyard.
A seismic shift in personnel was necessitated by the retirements of Virat Kohli and Ravindra Jadeja too after the last World Cup. In one fell swoop, India lost plenty of experience and wisdom, but if there is one format where these attributes are a little more expendable, it is the abridged one.
There is no shortage of international experience in the current side – Suryakumar himself, Hardik Pandya (who was Rohit’s deputy at the World Cup but eventually lost the captaincy race), potentially Rishabh Pant, Sanju Samson, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Shivam Dube, Jasprit Bumrah, Arshdeep Singh. By the time of the World Cup, joining that list will be Shubman Gill, Suryakumar’s designated vice-captain, his opening partner Abhishek, the precocious Tilak Varma and Varun Chakaravarthy.
Strong core
This was the core group that facilitated India’s triumphant, all-win march to the Asia Cup in Dubai and Abu Dhabi last month, this is the core group that will lead India’s charge at the World Cup next year. There are bound to be a couple of omissions due to form and fitness, a couple of additions owing to the former more than the latter. It’s a formidable unit, as evidenced by results over the last several months in a format that doesn’t always encourage consistency. Therefore, for more reasons than one, Suryakumar must be feeling the pressing need to pull his weight, to string together the kind of scores that once made him owner’s pride and neighbour’s envy.
India pride themselves on having a flexible, floating batting order beyond the openers. They also have shown a certain obsession with having a left-right combination together at the crease for as long as possible. The presence of accomplished left-handers Abhishek, Tilak, Dube, Axar, Washington Sundar and Rinku Singh has supplemented the right-handed complement of Gill, Suryakumar, Samson and Pandya, with Nitish Kumar Reddy (more injured than available in recent times) throwing up another interesting, exciting option when he is not in the infirmary.
But it won’t be the worst idea, both from an individual and a team perspective, for the skipper to make the No. 3 position his own for the time being, at least, so that he can control the innings, maybe take a few deliveries at the start if needed, and then open out. Suryakumar doesn’t need seven fielders in the ring to strike at 150 runs per 100 deliveries faced; he is a fabulous amalgam of power and placement, of force and timing, and has the uncanny knack of finding even the tiniest of gaps. Some of his strokes defy not just words but also imagination, such as the pick-up shot from outside off that can go anywhere between mid-wicket and fine-leg. But as the last year has shown, Suryakumar too is only human, and at least for now, a buttoned-down batting berth could be the way for him to find the runs that his touch deserves.
Perhaps the think-tank too is aligned to that line of thinking, because in Canberra on Wednesday in the first of five matches against Australia, he walked out at No. 3, at the fall of Abhishek’s wicket, to join Gill. In normal course, India would have injected the left-handed Tilak into the mix to replace a left-hander; Tilak is a wonderfully composed, creative and correct batter whose situational and game awareness is second to none, as he exemplified during a tense run-chase in the Asia Cup final against Pakistan. His title-clinching unbeaten 69, after India slumped to 20 for three in pursuit of 147, was as impeccable a knock under immense pressure as one can hope for.
Tilak had asked for and been given Suryakumar’s No. 3 slot during the tour of South Africa last November, and he justified his request with back-to-back centuries. But maybe now, given his recent travails, Suryakumar should pull rank and continue to bat at one-down because that is in both his and his team’s best interests.
Good signs
Before the rain cruelly intervened, there were signs in Canberra that Suryakumar was back in breathtaking run-making mood. There was a trademark whip-flick fourth ball, from Josh Hazlewood, that screamed over square-leg for six, a delivery after being opened up and comprehensively beaten by the outstanding Aussie quick. After the first rain break, there was a crunchy sweep against left-arm spinner Matt Kuhnemann, and three glorious boundaries in as many legal deliveries from Nathan Ellis before the final rain stoppage – an upper-cut and a drive over mid-off, both for fours, followed by a disdainful swing over mid-wicket for six. It was exhilarating, it was long overdue, it was lapped up with glee by another predominantly pro-Indian audience that made it seem like yet another home game for the men in blue.
The entertainment was rudely cut short by the elements, but the gauntlet has been thrown down. The Suryakumar that was slightly tentative and found ways and means of courting disaster in the Emirates wasn’t on view; instead, it was the vintage version fans have come to know and love. As the runs mounted, the swag returned and one could almost feel the mood lift in the dugout. Suryakumar’s final tally read 39 off 24, three fours and two sixes. Impressive, but not impressive as the manner in which he got there. The signs are promising, Australia have been forewarned.
Suryakumar has proved an able successor to Rohit when it comes to stacking up victories. Wednesday’s no-show dented his record slightly – he has now led the country to 23 wins in 30 matches as leader, first in a stand-in capacity and now on his own steam in the last 15 months – but only slightly. With the World Cup just a few months away, the emphasis will be less on the results and more on greater role-clarity and ironing out the inevitable creases, but in a result-driven setup such as Indian cricket, it is impossible to plan for the future alone at the expense of immediate outcomes.
India now have 14 more matches before they embark on the defence of the World Cup – four in Australia, and 10 against South Africa and New Zealand at home, which in all considered ways is the ideal lead-in to the mega bash. Suryakumar has already left an indelible imprint on his team in the last year and a quarter, but the greatest of challenges lies ahead.
Only a handful of Indians have had the privilege of leading the country in a World Cup in their own backyard – Kapil Dev, Mohammad Azharuddin, Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Rohit – and Dhoni apart, no one else has been able to take the team all the way. Ahead of Suryakumar is a glorious opening to emulate the charismatic Jharkhandi and wend his way into the World Cup pantheon. For that to eventuate, his bat must possess the loudest voice. No one knows it better than Suryakumar himself.
