Former South Africa All-Rounder Makes Prediction For Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Gives Valuable Suggestion To Hardik Pandya

Ex-South Africa's star also talked about the upcoming  Border-Gavaskar Trophy that is set to take place from Thursday in Nagpur.

India’s star all-rounder Hardik Pandya has been touted as the future T20I skipper of the Indian team. Under the leadership of Rohit Sharma, India whitewashed New Zealand by 3-0 in the ODI series while Pandya powered the visitors to a 2-1 series win in the shortest format. When asked about his future in the Red ball format, Hardik expressed his desire to play Test cricket as soon as possible. However, he stated that he will be prioritizing white-ball cricket. Former South Africa all-rounder JP Duminy has advised Pandya to become India's next all-format player.

“I'm always gonna be an advocate for all formats. I think if a player has the ability to influence the game and the player, you referring to Hardik, obviously, I've played with him as well. I think he has the ability to really be a great player for India across all formats. Now the reasoning for - why he is prioritizing white-ball, I would not know but I would certainly encourage him to do all (formats), ” Duminy told Hindustan Times.

The star all-rounder Pandya has played 11 Test matches for Team India and the last Test match that replayed was back in 2018 at Southampton. Duminy also talked about the upcoming  Border-Gavaskar Trophy that is set to take place from Thursday in Nagpur.

“I see it as a very close series, but I genuinely think that Australia stand a good chance. They certainly have been the team to beat. I feel it would be 2-1 to Australia and the Player of The Series for me would be Usman Khawaja,” he concluded.

Rohit Sharma-led India will be battling against Australia in the 1st Test of the four-match series at the Vidarbha Cricket Association Stadium on Thursday.

Squads:

India: Rohit Sharma (Captain), KL Rahul (vice-captain), Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer (injured and yet to recover), KS Bharat (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), R. Ashwin, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohd. Shami, Mohd. Siraj, Umesh Yadav, Jaydev Unadkat, Suryakumar Yadav. (Ravindra Jadeja's inclusion in the squad is subject to fitness report).

Australia: Pat Cummins (capt), Ashton Agar, Scott Boland, Alex Carey, Cameron Green (injured), Peter Handscomb, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Lance Morris, Todd Murphy, Matthew Renshaw, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc (injured), Mitchell Swepson, David Warner.