India will play England in first T20I in Kolkata on Wednesday
India’s new vice-captain Axar Patel said that the players have been told to be ready to bat anywhere across the order in the upcoming T20I series against England.
The Suryakumar Yadav-led team are set to play the first of the five T20Is at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Wednesday.
Being flexible with his batting preferences has been common for Axar, who has been promoted up the order at times, most famously at the T20 World Cup final last year, but it will be applied for every player in the team for the series.
“Batting wise, it’s not just with me, but we spoke in 2023-24 itself that the openers are fixed, but everyone from Nos. 3 to 7 have been told that they can come into bat anytime, in any situation. It is not just that one batter will bat at a particular position,” Axar said in a press conference ahead of the first T20I.
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He said that the team will be looking at one-on-one scenarios to shuffle the middle order.
“Our middle order will come to bat depending on the match situation, what kind of bowlers are bowling at the time, which match-up works well,” he added.
India have the likes of Tilak Varma, Suryakumar, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Hardik Pandya, Rinku Singh and Axar as the middle-order options with Washington Sundar providing depth in batting.
Axar, who has been promoted to the position of vice-captain for the first time, said that he has spoken to the coaching staff and praised the stability in the T20I team.
“It has just been a day, but as part of the leadership group there is an extra responsibility. The T20I side is settled, so there’s not much pressure, but there are small decisions that need making and during the game I need to work closely with Suryakumar,” he said.
Axar also spoke about the return of pacer Mohammad Shami, who has been picked for the England series as well as the Champions Trophy, returning to the national side after nearly 14 months.
“It’s a very positive thing for the team. The last time he (Shami) played was in the ODI World Cup final, and since his recovery, he has performed well in both the Syed Mushtaq Ali and Vijay Hazare tournaments,” the left-armer said.
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India and England didn’t play a bilateral T20I series since July 2022 and their only clashes in the shortest format came in the T20 World Cup semifinals in Australia (2022) and West Indies (2024). In their last clash at Providence, India won the semifinal by 68 runs en route to the title.
Even though the current focus is on the Champions Trophy next month, Axar has set his sights on the 2026 T20 World Cup set to be co-hosted by India and Sri Lanka.
“The T20I format is such that it is so fast that you have to make decisions quickly, so the larger conversations are about how to do that. The World Cup is coming up in a year so how we approach leading up to that, we want to try it from now itself. That’s the main target,” Axar said.
India will play the second T20I on January 25 in Chennai.
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