Focus on misfiring Dhawan as India look to seal T20I series against West Indies

After being dropped from the Test squad, India opener Shikhar Dhawan’s form in the limited-overs format has also seen a dip.

The left-handed batsman hasn’t notched up the big runs since his century against Pakistan in the Asia Cup. His highest total since then has been 38 that he scored in the fourth ODI against the West Indies.

One had expected a better display from Dhawan against a West Indies bowling attack that is bereft of any stars.

After a below par outing in the ODI series, Dhawan feel cheaply in the first T20I as well. Young pacer Oshane Thomas has had his number in the past couple of games. The opener has been castled twice now by the burly pacer.

For the past couple of years, Dhawan’s opening partnership with Rohit Sharma has been infallible. However, this slide in form could make life difficult for the left-handed batsman who has already lost favour in the longest format.

In the context of the current series, it is also important that Dhawan finds his scoring touch on Tuesday as the hosts would be hoping that their top-order could fire and ensure that India pockets the series before the last game.

In the previous game in Kolkata, India had a scare as early wickets left their relatively easy-looking run chase on shaky ground.

Fortunately, the lower order stepped up and took them over the line.

In Lucknow, the curator has once predicted a low-scoring game, with the bowlers likely to hold the advantage. This means that the contribution of the top-order would be crucial and the pressure would obviously be on Dhawan. But if anyone can counter-attack under pressure, it’s Shikhar Dhawan.

With the tour of Australia just around the corner, he will want to quickly find his feet. A few more missteps and he could well find himself out of favour for a place in the limited-overs side. While that possibility seems unlikely in the lead up to the World Cup next year, this team management has shown that it doesn’t shy away from dropping regular players based on their current form.

Laboured effort

While Dhawan will have his India team spot in mind when he takes the field in Lucknow, the Indian team would want to continue the winning momentum ahead of the Australia Tour.

The win at the Eden Gardens means India lead the reigning World T20 champions 5-3 in head-to-head record from nine exchanges between 2009 and 2017.

The five-wicket win in Kolkata might have looked a bit laboured for the hosts but the absence of batting talisman Virat Kohli cannot be discounted.

It was also the first T20 International for which India dropped Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the colossus whose batting form has been on the wane but the cricketing brain and reflexes behind the stumps remain assets for the team.

West Indies, on the other hand, would be desperate to return home with some positives at the end of a two-month tour in which they lost both the Test and ODI series.

While two-Test series was lost 0-2 in just six days of action, they posed some challenge in the subsequent ODI series before being thrashed 3-1 with a nine-wicket loss in Thiruvananthapuram in the final one-dayer.

The return of big names such as Kieran Pollard and Darren Bravo failed to make any significant impact as West Indies produced a below-par batting effort on Sunday and even they would want to justify their limited overs specialist tag with a domineering performance on Tuesday.