Samson Has Been Impressive But Can Not Think Of Replacing Pant: Former Indian Cricketer Doubts Sanju To Get World Cup Spot

Sanju Samson who returned not out in all three matches against South Africa and played one of the major roles in India's victory. He scored  118 runs in three matches at a strike rate of 114.56.

New Delhi: The Men in Blue defeated Proteas in the three-match ODI series by 2-1 after losing the first match. Team India thrashed the South African side in the rubber match played at the Arun Jaitley Stadium. They first bowled out SA for 99 runs and then chased it with 7 wickets and more than 30 overs remaining.

The Shikhar Dhawan-led squad was being called a second string team but the way they performed and thrashed an all-rounder side like South Africa in the final ODI, it will be disrespectful to refer to them like that.

Team India was playing this series without the likes of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant but Shreyas Iyer, Ishan Kishan and Sanju Samson did the perfect to fill their spots in their absence.

Sanju Samson who returned not out in all three matches against South Africa and played one of the major roles in India’s victory. He scored  118 runs in three matches at a strike rate of 114.56.

Wasim Jaffer while speaking to ESPN Cricinfo about Sanju Samson’s performance in the recent series said “Sanju Samson has definitely impressed me a lot. There’s always a question mark on his consistency but he showed that in this series. He couldn’t win India the game in the first match but finished the game in the second and remained not out in both (all three) games.”

Jaffer lauded Samson’s performance but still doubted his spot in the World Cup squad he said “I feel we forget his series-winning century in England very easily. That was in one-day cricket. In T20 cricket, definitely, he’s not very consistent, especially at number four and five but in Test and one-dayers, I don’t think there’s any opposition for him yet. Although KL Rahul can keep wickets and Sanju Samson has been impressive, I don’t think you can think of replacing Rishabh Pant in one-day cricket. Sanju Samson should be in the scheme of things because of how he plays but not at the cost of Rishabh Pant.”

Sanju Samson is an experienced player and he can be an useful asset for the Indian side during the World Cup 2023 but finding a spot in the World Cup squad won’t be easy with the likes of Iyer, Ishan kishan fighting for the same spot.

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