Opener Shikhar Dhawan has, for now, completed his India duties in short formats and is now focusing on domestic cricket. Like his other teammates Yuzvendra Chahal, Washington Sundar, Deepak Chahar and Sanju Samson, Dhawan, too, will take part in the ongoing Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. He will play for Delhi, which is playing its matches in Surat. The team will take on Jammu and Kashmir on November 14 having won two matches so far while two of its matches were abandoned due to rain.
The focus for the next few weeks will be on domestic cricket for Dhawan who also played in the Vijay Hazare Trophy. Clearly, he wants as much cricket under his belt going into the 2020 season where the focus will be on T20 cricket because of the T20 World Cup later next year. “I love playing cricket. Be it ODIs, T20s or even Ranji Trophy, I will play with the same positive mindset, energy and determination.”
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With a newly elected BCCI team in place, led by former skipper Sourav Ganguly, players’ decisions to play or miss matches, especially domestic matches, will be viewed differently from now on. Dhawan has lost his place in the Test side due to lack of runs, but it appears he has not given up the idea of playing all formats yet. His replacement Mayank Agarwal and newly promoted Rohit Sharma have done well but the present Test opening duo are yet to face sterner tests, especially away from home.
The dashing southpaw made a comeback to the Indian team in the T20I series against the West Indies post injury he sustained during the World Cup in England in June. Since then, his highest score has been 41 against Bangladesh in Delhi. As the senior player in the side and in the absence of Virat Kohli, the onus was on him and Rohit Sharma to give the Indian innings a solid start. Even as his opening partner Rohit Sharma continues to dazzle with his strokeful innings, all eyes are on Dhawan to get back to his match-winning form.
“I am enjoying my cricket... just going step by step,” said Dhawan. “The Bangladesh series was decent for me as also the one against South Africa. I have been playing aggressive cricket, though the Delhi knock was more watchful which was more due to the pitch which didn’t allow you to play shots easily. That was a lesson for me too. The going has been good for me so far.”
Dhawan, who is known to be heavily into analysis and technological help to improve his cricket, was in his home city Delhi before leaving for Surat. He launched #StanceBeam striker—a smart cricket bat sensor. He has already used the smart bat in a couple of net sessions and is expected to try it out after due permissions are taken from the BCCI in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. The sensor provides instant, 360-degree batting performance data analytics through a mobile app. It checks the user’s bat speed, back-lift angle and follow-through angle, among other things.
“This technology will no doubt help me, give me more clarity while training. For example, it helps in analysing why the number of sixes one is hitting might be fewer than before. Maybe the bat speed has decreased and then one correlates it to strength. Maybe one needs to work more on improving strength,” said Dhawan.