The Australian Cricket Coach Ricky Ponting has calculated that Indian WK-Batter is confident about playing in the upcoming IPL 2024.
Rishabh Pant confident about Playing IPL 2024
Ricky Ponting reckons that Rishabh Pant‘s availability for IPL 2024 will be great news for India and Delhi Capitals fans. The Indian cricketer Rishabh Pant met a horrific car accident on December 30, 2022, and has been sidelined from the game since then.
His journey of recovery and rehabilitation from a car accident has revealed Rishabh Pant’s fitness which is posted on Social media. During his recovery, he missed major tours and tournaments which included IPL 2023, ODI World Cup 2023, and Asia Cup 2023.
With IPL 2024 set to be started next month, Rishabh Pant is expected to return for the action. Ricky Ponting also feels that the 26-year-old is ready to return to action but is not sure about his captaincy in the domestic league.
Rishabh Pant has been giving fitness updates on his recovery on Social media to encourage fans. He was one of the retained players in the Delhi Capitals squad.
“Rishabh is very confident that he’s going to be right to play. In what capacity we’re not quite sure yet. You would have seen all the social media stuff, he’s up and about and running well. But in saying that we’re only six weeks away from the first game as well. So we’re not sure if we’ll get wicketkeeping out of him this year,” Ponting said.
“But I’ll guarantee if I asked him now he’ll say, ‘I’m playing every game, I’m keeping every game and I’m batting at No.4.’ That’s just what he’s like, but we’ll keep our fingers crossed,” he added.
While Rishabh Pant is in doubt about featuring the entire season, Ponting thinks that the WK-Batter playing in 10 games will be a bonus after missing the previous season.
“He’s such a dynamic player. He’s obviously our captain. We missed him incredibly last year. If you understand the journey he’s been on for the last 12-13 months, it was a horrific incident. One that I know he feels very lucky to have even survived, let alone have the chance to play cricket again.
“We’ll just keep our fingers crossed and hope that he can be out there and play. Even if it’s not all the games, if we can manage him through 10 of the 14 games or whatever that might be then whatever games you can get out of him will be a bonus,” said Ponting.
Delhi Capitals had a weak performance during the IPL 2023 season as they finished second last by winning only 5 matches out of 14.
“With Harry Brook coming into the set-up as well, so Warner, [Mitch] Marsh, Harry Brook, we’ve got some really good overseas batters,” Ponting said.
“Marsh and Warner will bat up the top somewhere and Harry Brook has been finishing off with England, so he’ll probably play a finishing role for us there.
“[If] we can get [Anrich] Nortje and Jhye Richardson fit, and with the two spin options we’ve got with Axar Patel and Kuldeep Yadav we’ve got a really good squad that to be fair has probably underperformed the last couple of years, so we’ve got some work to do,” Ponting added.
With the IPL 2024 dates confirmed, the Board of Control for Cricket in India is working on the league’s schedules in order not to collide with the dates of the Election in India.
