Harsha Bhogle, one of India’s renowned cricket analyst and commentator, questioned Pakistan’s white-ball captain Babar Azam’s effectiveness in the T20 cricket due to his strike-rate.
At the moment, Babar is Pakistan’s best batsman in all three formats of the game and even the premier batsman is among the few players who are in the top five of the ICC Rankings for batsmen across the formats.
He has been consistently scoring runs for his team but his strike-rate is always questioned despite averaging well in the T20 cricket and maintaining the top spot for the past few months.
The 25-year old averages 50.72 in the shortest format and scored 1471 runs in 38 T20Is at a strike rate of 128.13 so far while Bhogle pointed out his strike-rate was around 115 in the initial days of his T20I career, lamenting the fact that how the change in format shifts the focus from average to strike-rate.
Speaking on the podcast ‘Red Inker with Jarrod Kimber’, Bhogle said: “For the major part of his first two or three years, Babar Azam had a batting average of 50 or 55 but a strike rate of 120.”
He further added, “If you are playing with a strike rate of 110 or 115 in T20 cricket, the longer you bat, the more you are ensuring your team’s defeat. Suddenly the batting average is running contrary to what batting average does in any other form of cricket.”
Noteworthy, Babar is currently in England preparing for a three-match Test series starting from August 5 followed by three T20Is amid the Coronavirus crisis.
(With Sportskeeda Inputs)
