Mumbai: In a baffling twist that has cricket pundits scratching their heads, explosive wicketkeeper-batter Sanju Samson was inexplicably benched during batting against Bangladesh in the Asia Cup Super 4 clash, despite India losing six wickets while chasing a modest total.
The Men in Blue limped to 168 all out in 20 overs, only to defend it emphatically with a 41-run victory, but the post-match chatter centres on head coach Gautam Gambhir’s curious call to sideline Samson.
Samson, fresh off a match-winning 56 against Oman —earning him Player of the Match honours — found himself demoted from opener to middle-order fodder. Yet, when Shubman Gill’s gritty 47 ended a promising 77-run stand with Abhishek Sharma (75), in strode Shivam Dube at No. 3, managing a mere 2. Hardik Pandya followed, then Tilak Varma and Axar Patel, as the innings unravelled. The bottom four — Dube, Suryakumar Yadav (5), Varma (0), and Patel (11)— faced 36 balls for a paltry 22 runs, without a single boundary. There were no significant hits in the last seven overs, and only 56 runs were scored in the final nine overs, a situation that begged for Samson’s skill.
Fans are fuming on social media, branding Gambhir’s rejig a “strategic blunder”. “Samson as a joker? He said it tongue-in-cheek to Manjrekar, but this is no joke,” tweeted one supporter.
With Suryakumar Yadav entrenched at three and Tilak at four, Samson’s No. 5 slot never materialised, fuelling doubts over Gambhir’s faith in the Kerala dasher’s middle-order mettle.
India bounced back with spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Axar Patel dismantling Bangladesh for 127, but the batting oversight lingers. As the final beckons, will Gambhir rethink his order, or is Samson’s Asia Cup dream fading?
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