Former Australian national cricket team wicketkeeper-batsman Ian Healy has called India national cricket team’s star wicketkeeper-batsman Rishabh Pant a “work in progress” cricketer.
Ian Healy opined that Rishabh Pant’s wicket-keeping is a work in progress and he will have to make a lot of improvements to improve it.
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Rishabh Pant has 19 dismissals to his name in BGT 2024-25
The star wicketkeeper-batsman of the Indian National Cricket Team has not been at his best behind the stumps in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2024-25.
Pant has dropped quite a few catches and has looked sloppy while maintaining the wicket. However, despite not being at his best, Pant has 19 dismissals to his name.
In three matches in Perth, Adelaide and Brisbane, Rishabh Pant has taken 19 catches behind the stumps, his best performance being 5 catches in an innings. Additionally, his dismissals per entry ratio is 3.166.
Pant’s numbers are better than Australia National Cricket Team’s wicketkeeper-batsman Alex Carey, who has 15 dismissals to his name with 13 catches and 2 knocks and a dismissal per innings of 2.5.
Rishabh Pant is a work in progress, but I watched him in the mornings and I like the exercises he’s doing – Ian Healy
Meanwhile, Ian Healy said Pant will surely improve his keeping skills and pointed out that the Indian superstar sometimes makes wrong initial moves, leading to missed catches.
“Rishabh Pant is a work in progress but I watched him in the mornings and I like the drills he is doing; he will surely improve further. Sometimes, like he did when he dropped a catch in this series earlier, he can make a wrong initial move .
“Some goalkeepers like to move a touch to their left first and then press from there. It’s better to stay still and if you can’t, then you start that shooting movement a touch earlier so that when the ball is out, you can still press towards the right side. You have to make one of those two decisions,” Healy told the Indian Express.
Rishabh Pant has struggled with the bat in BGT 2024-25
Pant has also been poor with the bat in the five-match Test series against the Australia national cricket team. Expectations were quite high from Rishabh Pant when India landed in Australia considering his past heroics in the country.
Pant has made good starts and has played his natural aggressive game. However, he has not been able to convert those outings into big scores.
The 27-year-old has recorded scores of 37, 1, 21, 28 and 9 in the five innings he has batted. In total, he has scored just 96 runs at an average of 19.20 and a strike rate of 60.00. His poor results with the bat have been one of the main reasons behind India’s struggles in the batting department.