England’s star all-rounder Ben Stokes admitted that Suryakumar Yadav will be the biggest threat for the Three Lions when they face Team India in the second semi-final of the ICC T20 World Cup 2022 on Thursday (November 10) at the Adelaide Oval.
He also talked about how Virat Kohli has earned the right to never be written off after regaining his form since the Asia Cup 2022.
Stokes said that the in-form Suryakumar has "set the world alight" with his batting, but he hopes that England will be able to not allow the Indian batter to show his beast mode in Adelaide. Notably, Suryakumar is in red-hot form in the T20 World Cup 2022, where he has already three fifties.
Ben Stokes stated: “Suryakumar obviously came in and set the world alight. He is a fantastic player and plays some shots where you sort of just scratch the head sometimes. He is in great form, but hopefully we can try and shut him down and not allow him to get on one of his rampages.”
The star all-rounder was also hopeful that England would be able to lift the T20 World Cup trophy in Australia. Stokes noted: “We have got two more games to go hopefully… and hopefully lift the trophy in the end. But we know we need to get this game done on Thursday against a very strong Indian team which no one will ever take lightly because the team they are and the players that they have in their squad.”
Meanwhile, Virat Kohli is currently leading the batting chart at the T20 World Cup 2022 with 246 runs at an average of 123, and Stokes said that the Indian star should never have been written off when he was battling a bad patch.
Stokes signed off by saying, “I think with Virat he could have four unbelievable years like he had, and then have a not-so-loud couple of months and then for some reason plays like that and gets written off, we have got no idea why. I think he has earned the right to never be written off.
You don’t produce the numbers and produce the innings that he does in all three formats and it’s fine. We as players and people who play against him a lot, we never take anything he has done in the game before into the game we have got here.”
(With AFP/PTI Inputs)
