Delhi Capitals captain Rishabh Pant seems to be in the good books of the Legendary West Indian batsman Brian Lara and Australia legend and DC coach Ricky Ponting, as they praise his recent performance and look at him with high hopes for the near future.
Speaking of his performance of late, the West Indies legend believes that the 23-year-old wicket-keeper batsman has improved a lot in the recent months, who will be successful in leading Delhi Capitals to the top 4 of the table in IPL 2021. The hard-hitting youngster was handed the captaincy after Shreyas Iyer was ruled out due to injury.
“He has grown in the last 4 months and I think he will do a good job,” said the WI legend who holds the record of the highest individual score in Test Cricket. Pant, who has proved to be a match-winner on certain occasions in recent times, won the match against CSK despite missing the services of Axar Patel (who is recovering from covid-19), Kagiso Rabada, and Anrich Nortje.
Talking about the match-winning abilities of Pant, DC coach Ponting compares the youngster with a few of the current best of the game, including Kane Williamson and Virat Kohli. However, Ponting also bluntly mentions the cons of the player who disappointed him in the previous season.
“He was disappointing for us in the last season, he had entered the edition with a lot of overweight.”
The Aussie legend also mentioned the criticism that the youngster faces regarding his keeping methods, but in his defense, he said, “the way I saw him keeping on those turning wickets against England, he kept better than I thought he could. If his keeping continues to improve, he could be India’s wicketkeeper-batsman for the next 10-12 years.”
Ricky Ponting commends Pant’s improvement in fitness and wicket-keeping skills, which has eventually made him a match-winner for India. He talks about getting Pant to play in the correct position so that it’s easier for DC to win matches. The Australian coach says that he is a “Brilliant bloke to have in your team.”
DC hit with another covid blow
Delhi Capitals is struck with another problem as Anrich Nortje tested positive for covid-19, who was supposed to feature in upcoming patches. The franchise will now be missing the services of Nortje as well Patel due to the viral infection. There is still no update from DC on Nortje’s situation, while Patel is still in isolation as DC gear up to play against Rajasthan Royals on Thursday.