It will not be easy for Hardik Pandya to captain in ODIs, know what is the big challenge

Hardik Pandya ODI Captain: The three-match ODI series between India and Australia is starting from 17 March. In the first ODI, Rohit Sharma will be absent due to family reasons, in which case Hardik Pandya will lead India’s ODI team. By the way, till now Hardik Pandya’s captaincy record in T20 International has been excellent, but now he will take charge of the ODI team for the first time, so this challenge will not be easy for him.

While captaining Gujarat Titans in IPL 2022, Hardik Pandya made his team the champion in the very first time itself. Soon after this, in June 2022, he got a chance to captain India’s T20 team on the tour of Ireland. Since then, Pandya has captained India in 11 matches and out of these, Team India has won 8. That is, Pandya’s captaincy record in T20 cricket has been commendable.

What will be the challenges before Hardik in ODIs?

• There is a vast difference between the 20 over and 50 over formats. Pandya himself has been more successful as an all-rounder in T20 cricket than in ODIs. He has not even been a regular part of India’s ODI squad. In such a situation, the biggest challenge for him will be to fit in the ODI team as an all-rounder.
• The second biggest challenge of Hardik as captain will be to choose the playing-11 of Team India. It will not be easy for Hardik to choose 11 out of 17 players for Team India. Will he make KL Rahul a part of his playing-11, this will also be a big question. The selection for him in spin bowling all-rounders is also going to be complicated. They have options like Washington Sundar, Ravindra Jadeja and Akshar Patel here. Then Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav will also be available here as spinners. In such a situation, it will not be easy for Hardik to choose any two or three of these five.
• The third biggest challenge for Hardik will be the opposition team Australia. All the teams that Hardik has captained in T20 cricket so far, they have been weak compared to Australia. There is more than one veteran player in Australia’s ODI squad, who will not be easy to face. In batting where Hardik will have to prepare a special strategy to stop players like David Warner, Travis Head, Cameron Green, Maxwell and Stoinis. At the same time, players like Mitchell Starc and Adam Zampa will also have to face in bowling.
• Hardik will also have a smart captain in front of him, who has a lot of captaincy experience in ODI cricket. In fact, in the absence of Pat Cummins, Steve Smith is the captain of Australia, who has already commanded Australia in 51 matches. In the recently concluded Test series, he gave Australia an unexpected victory in the Indore Test.

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