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Kotak made the suggestion while addressing Abhishek Sharma's two back-to-back ducks in the tournament so far. While Kotak asserted that the team is not worried about Abhishek's twin failures, they would want him firing before the Super 8.
India batting coach Sitanshu Kotak has asked the batter to be more adapt to team needs as per the situation while trying to maintain the attacking style. Kotak's comments came on the eve of India's last group-stage match in T20 World Cup 2026. India play Netherlands in their last Group A match on Wednesday (Feb 18). Kotak made the suggestion while addressing Abhishek Sharma's two back-to-back ducks in the tournament so far. While Kotak asserted that the team is not worried about Abhishek's twin failures, they would want him firing before the Super 8 fixtures with Netherlands match offering perfect opportunity to do so.
"I think playing aggressive cricket is important. But I don't think plans change based on whether a player has failed or not," Kotak said at the pre-match press conference. "If anything, plans will change according to situations. No matter whether somebody has scored runs for two innings or somebody hasn't, it's important to adapt to what the team needs.
"Like the Mumbai game where Surya had to stay there for a while, and he had to go at run-a-ball more or less for 30-35 balls - that's playing to the situation. Whether someone scores runs or not is not important, what team requires at a time and players trying to execute that is more important," the India batting coach explained with an example.
With six points after three wins in three matches, India are certain to top Group A if they lose against Netherlands or the match gets washed out. They have already qualified for the Super 8 where the Suryakumar Yadav-led team is placed in Group X along with South Africa, West Indies, and Zimbabwe. Each team will play once each against the rest of the teams in each group in Super 8 and top two teams from each group will advance to semis.