By: Drcricket7 Staff
After losing the Galle Test match against Sri Lanka, the Indian selectors asked all-rounder Stuart Binny to join the national team in the Emerald of Isle. And, as the team management was keen to play with five bowlers in the second Test match, Stuart Binny was inducted into the team in place of struggling off-spinner Harbhajan Singh.
However, after two days of hard-fought cricket during the 2nd Test against the hosts, Stuart Binny is yet come out good. With the bat, he could only make 10 runs, and with the ball, he was more of a part-time bowler than a regular.
Stuart Binny bowled 66 balls out of which 53 were dot balls. But not for a moment, he looked to trouble Sri Lanka batsmen. If you have a bowling all-rounder like Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who is more experienced than Binny, opting for the latter is indeed a strange choice.
Stuart Binny joined the team in short notice and wasn’t given ample time to settle down. The usual cliché that an international cricketers should be always be ready is understandingly all there, but the general trend of any good side is to pick players who have got acclimatized to the conditions – rather than picking a new comer unless he is game changer.
Bhuvneshwar Kumar has been in Sri Lanka from the time his team reached Colombo in the first week of August. Fortunately, this strange choice of making Binny play the ongoing Test may not hurt India much, but this kind of stop-gap arrangement will also not help the Test team.
If Virat Kohli and his men are looking to rebuild their side and make a top team in the world, they will have to take the right steps. There are questions being raised also about backing Rohit Sharma ahead of Cheteshwar Pujara — so much so that the Mumbai batsman was demoted to maximise his use in the team.
Fortunately, Rohit made a fifty in the first innings to justify his place. But Binny’s case is slightly different. Undoubtedly, he is an important player in the shorter and shortest formats of the game for India.
He is also a very serious contender to represent India in the World T20 Championship, which is scheduled to be played in India. But, does that justify his place in the Test team? The a few fans, who watched the proceedings of the game, wanted to know more about the dressing room politics!
