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Anil Jauhri

New Delhi I Friday I 10-04-2026

As IPL 2026 roars into action and euphoria over the T20 Word Cup win subsides, it is time to dispassionately look at what did not work for India in the T20 World Cup.
The first concern should be that the much-vaunted batting did not fire consistently through the tournament giving India anxious moments even against such minnows as USA where Suryakumar Yadav’s captain’s knock extricated us from a perilous situation. Same was true of most matches in round robin phase where one or two batters like Ishan Kishan against Pakistan helped India to respectability until the last 3 matches where the batting actually clicked running up scores of nearly or 200 plus. India were fortunate that the one off day they suffered was in the round robin against South Africa because in the past, similar off day in knockouts has meant losing in semi finals or even finals.
Within the batting line up, the biggest concern must be the performance of the captain Yadav himself who started with an exceptional undefeated 84 against USA and then faded off with scores of 12, 32, 34, 18, 33, 18, 11 and zero in the final. That is underwhelming performance by any yardstick and coupled with his poor run in the year 2025 (21 – Inns; 218 – Runs; 13.62 – Avg; 123.16 – SR; 47 – HS), should raise doubts about his place in the team. Especially since there are a number of batters, some with captaincy credentials, waiting in the wings who could any day walk into the side like Shubman Gill, Sai Sudarshan, Ruturaj Gaekwad, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul, and Devdutt Paddikal to name a few.
Another area of concern was the bowling which leaked runs against even the weaker teams like 176 against Netherlands, 184 against Zimbabwe and 195 and 246 against the stronger West India and England respectively. In fact but for some sensational bowling by Bumrah in the 18th over for a measly 6 runs, we might have lost against England in the semifinals despite a formidable score of 253 and been bundled out of the tournament.
Given Indian conditions, did we play the right combination is a question worth asking. Should we have played 3 spinners rather than two and should Kuldeep Yadav have been in throughout. Many experts did say that Yadav should have played. In just one game against Pakistan that he played, he had excellent figures of 1/14 in 3 overs.
One failing Indian bowling suffered from was that the sixth bowling option did not work. It has to be accepted that Dube, while being brilliant with the bat, was a failure as 6th bowler and if any one frontline bowlers had an off day, India were short of options.
The other concern was the below par performance of Varun Chakravarthy especially in the crucial encounters towards the end of the tournament. Except Pakistan, his economy rate against the biggies, South Africa, England and New Zealand was 11.75, 16 and 13 respectively indicating that batters may have possibly worked him out. The team management may have persisted with him for continuity but it was a gamble which nearly cost India the semi final against England.
So where do we go from here?
India has 18 T20 internationals in 2026 in front of it – 5 in England. 3 in Zimbabwe and 2 in Ireland first while playing 8 at home against Sri Lanka and the West Indies later.
The strategy overseas obviously has to differ from that at home and the team combination would have to be different.
The bowling combination changes with accent on pace overseas – which could mean playing 3 pacers (Bumrah, Arshdeep, Siraj), 2 spinners (Axar, Varun or Yadav) and one pace all rounder (Pandya). Or 2 pacers (Bumrah, Arshdeep), 2 spinners (Axar, Varun or Yadav) and 2 pace all rounders (Pandya, Dube). The selectors may consider latter option of playing Dube as 3rd pacer or 2nd allrounder in place of one spinner given his medium pace may be more useful overseas but his batting may be less effective against pace. This is one hard choice that would need to be made.
The batting line up currently looks settled – Samson and Abhishek at the top, and Ishan, Yadav and Tilak bringing up the rest with only Yadav’s place as mentioned earlier being questionable.
The fight would be for the additional places – one batter in the middle where there are plenty of options but Gill could be a front runner given his record last year in England, one extra seamer in overseas conditions in addition to Bumrah, Arshdeep and Siraj to make up 15 and one additional spin option in home conditions maybe Sundar.
If there is 16th slot available, that could also be for a batter in the middle – even Rahul could be a candidate given his stellar performance in Test last year - but this is T20 some would argue - or Yashasvi Jaiswal although opening slot currently is blocked and Shreyas Iyer might be better choice .
There is quite a bit of headache for selectors there and whatever choices they make, there would be questions raised.
What would be needed is ability to bat in pace friendly conditions.
And for that current IPL may not be a good pointer!!!

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