A short video clip of the third test match between India and Australia went viral on social media. In that clip, it was seen that Indian skipper Rohit Sharma giving instructions to the 12th man Ishan Kishan for the veteran batter Cheteshwar Pujara. Rohit advised to hit the ball over the boundary and play some fancy shots so that the Indian team got some more runs on the board. However, Pujara welcomed the instructions from the skipper and hit the ball over the boundary, after which Rohit was seen smiling in the dressing room.
But this act didn’t seem good for some former cricketers like Harbhajan Singh, and he responded that Pujara was on the field at that time and he could understand the situation better than the dressing room. And that’s why the Indian team should allow him to play his natural game.
“I don’t know what the actual message was sent. If the message were to look to play over mid-on, the inside player would know the conditions better. Let him play. Let him understand what needs to be done in that situation. No one can judge better than him how easy or difficult it is to hit over mid-on. Watching from the outside, we feel that he can hit above mid-on, but sometimes it does not happen,” former Indian cricketer Harbhajan said.
Harbhajan Singh added that if the team asks for something to do, then Pujara will do that for the team. He is a selfless player who always wants to play for the nation first. And more thing he added is that Pujara can hit over the top better than any player because a test player can become a good T20 player, but a T20 player can’t do that.
“If there is a situation where a message comes from outside that the team is asking you to do something, Cheteshwar Pujara is certainly a player who will first do what the team needs. If the team needed runs there, he went for that. He is more than capable of hitting sixes. An atmosphere has been created that Pujara cannot hit over the top. If he wants to do that, he can do it better than a lot of the players. A Test cricketer can become a good T20 player, but a T20 player can never become a good Test player. So Pujara’s shot did not surprise me,” Harbhajan further added
