Not KL Rahul! Harbhajan Singh picks young batter who should open with Rohit Sharma for India in T20Is

Former India spinner Harbhajan Singh wants the Indian team to promote young Ishan Kishan as an opener alongside Rohit Sharma in T20Is. While Rohit has been India's permanent opener in limited-overs cricket for several years now, KL Rahul has managed to topple Shikhar Dhawan from the top spot and make the second opening slot his own in the last few years.

Rahul and Rohit have been opening for India in both ODIs and T20Is for a while now and have enjoyed tremendous success as a pair. However, Harbhajan believes having someone like Kishan as an opener will give India's batting line-up another dimension and the team can expect explosive starts in the shortest format.

Kishan, who made his ODI and T20I debut for India last year, has seen his stocks rise in the last couple of years owing to his batting exploits in the Indian Premier League (IPL) and domestic cricket. Kishan turned out to be the most expensive buy at the recently-concluded IPL 2022 meg auction where he was roped in by Mumbai Indians for a whopping Rs 15.25 crore (INR 152.5 million).

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Kishan opened the batting with Rohit in the first ODI of the recently-concluded three-match ODI series against West Indies in the absence of Rahul. He now looks set to once again open the batting with Rohit in the upcoming three-match T20I series against West Indies which gets underway from Wednesday (February 15). Rahul is not a part of the series due to an injury.

Harbhajan recently explained why Kishan should be India's first-choice opener in T20Is while suggesting that Rahul can be slotted in the middle-order which will also give India flexibility in the batting line-up.

"In my opinion, you don't have to prepare Ishan Kishan, he is a ready player. You have to play him, you have to think how you can get him in. If you can bat KL Rahul at No. 5 in ODIs, why not in this format?," Harbhajan said on Star Sports.

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"We understand that when he [Rahul] comes down the order in ODIs, he is capable of playing the big shots. So if he bats at No. 5 in T20Is, I feel it will not be a bad thing because you will get a strong middle order and along with that if you want to score 40-60 runs in the first six, you need a fearless player like Ishan Kishan up the order," he added.

India also have young Ruturaj Gaikwad, who was added to the T20I squad as Rahul's replacement. Gaikwad has been a revelation for Chennai Super Kings as an opener in the IPL and can be used as an opener by the Indian team for the West Indies T20Is.