‘He has been better than many other great batters’: Harbhajan Singh on Hardik Pandya’s brilliant run with the bat

Gujarat has been brilliant with their all-round show in the Indian T20 League 2022. They are riding on the back of some brilliant performances by their skipper Hardik Pandya in the batting department.

Pandya has scored 308 runs in the tournament at a strike rate of 135.68 and an average of 51.33. Notably, he has successfully played the role of a proper batter while batting up the order for Gujarat. He is batting at number three or four for the team and has shown great composure and maturity in his batting setting up foundations for his team.

Hardik Pandya played for Mumbai prior to this season. In his previous franchise, he was generally sent lower down the batting order and was tasked with the job of providing power-packed finishes for the team. So, the Hardik Pandya 2.0 has surprised everybody and everyone is enjoying his new version. One such person impressed by Hardik’s new approach is the former Indian off-spinner Harbhajan Singh.

In a conversation with Sportskeeda, Bhajji said – “Hardik has a great technique. He can be a proper batsman. But we hadn’t seen him in this role until now. He usually used to come down the order and smash big hits. Now, he has the opportunity to come to bat properly with 17-18 overs remaining in the innings, and he has looked like a top-class batter.”

“I don’t want to compare him to anybody but, with the game that he has shown so far, he has been better than many other great batters at the moment,”-he added.

Notably, Bhajji is a follower of the popular belief that the best batter of a team must face the most number of deliveries in a T20 game. Thus, he feels that Hardik Pandya could even be more dangerous at the death if he gets time to settle down.

“I would want Hardik to have such chances in the Indian team as well. You can have someone else as a finisher. If you have such solid players like him at number three-four, you don’t need to send him down the order. When you are set, in the latter overs you can do more damage. He has been phenomenal with the bat, outstanding with the ball topo. He is making a strong case for himself,”- Bahajji expressed his opinion.