Did selectors miss a trick by not sending Prithvi Shaw as opener on England tour?
Prithvi Shaw finds himself in the news more often than not. If he scores runs, he is talked about in cricketing circles. And, if he fails to score runs, he is talked about in cricketing circles. Recently when an Indian player was injured, Shaw’s name was once again in the limelight.
Now, it has been confirmed that Shubman Gill has been ruled out of the Test series against England that will commence in August. Gill has a shin injury, and will not take part in the England series. There were talks that Prithvi Shaw is likely to fly over to England as a cover for Shubman Gill.
And definitely, Prithvi Shaw should have been given a chance to take guard for India in England. Shaw has been in rollicking form in the recent past with the willow and has decimated almost every single bowling attack that he has come across.
In the 2021 season of the Vijay Hazare Trophy, Shaw did not put a single foot wrong. In the 8 innings that he played, the diminutive right-hander scored a staggering 827 runs at an average of 165.40 and a strike rate of close to 140. The 21-year-old scored 4 centuries in the tournament as well.
If that was not enough, Shaw ripped apart the bowlers in the 14th edition of the IPL as well. In the 8 innings that he played for the Delhi Capitals in the 2021 IPL season, Shaw scored 308 runs and scored them at a colossal strike rate of 166.49. He also scored 3 fifties, and the Delhi side triumphed every time Shaw scored a half-century in the IPL this year.
To be fair, Shaw has not been given a lot of chances to prove his worth. He experienced a scintillating start to his Test career and scored a century on debut against the West Indies at home. He followed that up by scoring a half-century in his next Test as well.
After the West Indies series, Shaw failed to score runs in the two-match Test series against New Zealand. In the 4 innings that he played in the series, he scored a total of 98 runs at an average of under 25.00. But, even the ‘big names’ of Indian cricket fared miserably in the land of the Kiwis. Indian skipper Virat Kohli scored 38 runs in the entire series at an average of below 10, and Ajinkya Rahane did not fare well either.
The Indian vice-captain aggregated a total of just 91 runs in the series against New Zealand. Shaw scored more runs than Kohli and Rahane in the New Zealand series. After that, he played only one Test in Australia, where he scored 4 runs in the entire Test. And after that, the Mumbaikar was sidelined. How fair is that?
Shaw has proven that he is on top of his game in the recent past. He has scored a truckload of runs with the willow this year and will be extremely high on confidence as well. And with Gill injured, Shaw should surely be provided with another chance to prove his worth for his country in the toughest and most demanding format of the game.
