Bharat Arun pins hopes on Shardul Thakur to be the next seaming all-rounder
Team India’s bowling coach Bharat Arun praised all-rounder Hardik Pandya and said Shardul Thakur could be the next seaming all-rounder India needs.
India’s bowling coach Bharat Arun during the interaction with the Press Trust of India (PTI) facilitated by Ironwood Education Company explained in detail how Shardul Thakur could be the next fast bowling all-rounder for India, heaped praises for Hardik Pandya, and the workload management of the pacers.
Bharat Arun on options besides Hardik Pandya who wasn’t picked for in the squad for Tests due to not being fit for bowling.
“It is more of a selectors’ job to find them and then we can develop those all-rounders. Shardul has proved he can be an all-rounder. What he did in Australia was fabulous,” Arun said.
Shardul Thakur scored a 67. Also took six wickets in a test match on the iconic Australian tour earlier this year.
Arun stated that finding someone as good as Pandya would be a real challenge.
“I wish you could just wish and develop bowlers like that. Hardik is an outstanding talent, but unfortunately, he had to undergo a back operation, and then it’s not very easy to come back after that,” he said. Hardik Pandya has had back issues since 2019. In IPL too, he wasn’t bowled due to the same reason, resulting in him not featuring in the Test squad for the upcoming Test series.
“He bowled against England, I thought he did a really good job. But, to sustain that we need to manage him well and build on his strength,” he added.
Thakur had a good away series against Australia this year, putting up a solid round performance in Brisbane
“So ideally, yes (we need to develop seam bowling all-rounder), there must be a few (in domestic cricket) because we are always on the circuit with the Indian team, we have not had an opportunity to look at the domestic all-rounders,” he added.
Concerning managing workload and the current bio-bubble environment, here is what Arun had to say.
“Even we have a policy in place at the moment. We have rested players in between matches, and also some top players for a series and things like that. It is under place, even for us,” Arun said.
“That is going to be the future because of the volume of cricket that is being played, and also with all the current rules which are going to exist for some time. I think it is extremely important that the players are fresh mentally, physically, so workload management is going to be big in the future.”
India has six pacers in the squad – Ishant Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Umesh Yadav, Shardul Thakur, and Mohammad Siraj. Arun lauded the Indian pace attack and rotation policy for bowlers.
“If if you look at them (all six), you could put any three or four out of them on the park. They are good enough to do the job for us. So that is a very, very healthy trend for Indian cricket,” said Arun.
“And so the five-Test matches that we’re going to play after the World Test Championship, there’s a definite cause of necessity for us to rotate all the bowlers so that they stay fresh,” he explained.
India will play World Test Championship against New Zealand in mid-June and the five-match Test series against Engl England starting from August 4th.