Kohli reveals miscommunication in Pant, Iyer batting order
With Pant continuously falling short of numbers to show for his opportunities, there has been a growing call to swap his place with Iyer, who bats at 5
India were caught in an awkward spot at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on Sunday, when they had two batsmen walking out to bat at No. 4. Both Rishabh Pant and Shreyas Iyer strode out after the fall of Shikhar Dhawan's wicket, the former pacing forward from the dugout while the latter emerging from behind the sightscreen. Both were unaware until they spotted each other and didn't seem to know what was happening.
Virat Kohli, who was batting in the middle when this happened, admitted in his post-match presser that there indeed had been a "communication problem" between the team management and the two players.
"The batting coach (Vikram Rathour) had a word with both of them and there was a misunderstanding about who had to go [out] at what stage of the game. It was a bit funny afterwards because they both wanted to walk in. It would have been very funny if both had reached the pitch," Kohli said after the match. "There was a miscommunication there. I understood it afterwards."
With Pant continuously falling short of numbers to show for his opportunities, there has been a growing call to swap his place with Iyer, who currently bats at No.5 a la the setup in Delhi Capitals. Kohli clarified that there was a plan in motion to decide who would bat at No. 4 in which situation, just that it wasn't executed very well on the day.
"We had it planned according to phases. After 10 overs we had decided Rishabh would walk in; before that Shreyas had to walk in. But both of them got confused and didn't realize who has to walk in at what stage of the game."
Dhawan fell in the seventh over, meaning it was Iyer's chance to bat at No. 4 but it was Pant who ended up batting there. The 21 year old scored 19 off 21 whereas Iyer made 5 off 8. Both of them were out to the left-arm spinner Bjorn Fortuin.
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