Australian pacer Mitchell Starc, who opted out of playing at the recent Champions Trophy, has heaped rich praise on Indian cricket and its depth. He has also lauded middle-order batter KL Rahul as the Indian cricket team’s ‘Mr Fix It’ in a recent interview.
“KL Rahul is like Mr. Fix It for India. He has opened the batting when asked to, batted at Number 6, kept wickets, fielded, batted in middle order — he has done just about everything, he has played vital roles, excited to play alongside him,” said Starc on the Fanatics TV YouTube channel.
Starc went on to praise Rahul as a gentleman. Another Australian cricketer Moises Henriques, who was also part of the interview, agreed with Starc and lauded Rahul for his kindness.
While talking about the depth in Indian team’s ranks, Starc said in the interview: “The depth in Indian cricket… India are probably the only nation in the world that could have a Test team, an ODI team and a T20I team play on the same day. They could maybe be playing against Australia in the Tests, England in the ODIs and South Africa in the T20. And India would be competitive! Not other country could do that.”
Starc was asked in the interview if Indian players were gaining an edge from consistently playing high-intensity games in the Indian Premier League.
Starc pointed out the disadvantage for Indians. “Not sure Indians have an advantage. Because the rest of us have opportunities to play franchise cricket all around the world, but the Indian guys can only play in the IPL. Sure it’s the number 1 product (in franchise cricket). IPL’s top notch and for 8-10 weeks you have high-class cricket, you get games every few days as a player. But I don’t think you can sit on that. Because there are guys who play for four or five different franchise leagues a year, so they’re still getting exposure to white ball cricket.”
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