After losing the Test series 2-1, Team India suffered a disappointing whitewash at the hands of South Africa on their home turf in the ODI series. The hosts won all the matches of the 3 match series and inflicted a humiliating defeat upon the Blues. This was KL Rahul’s first major series as team India’s ODI captain and he would definitely like to forget his captaincy debut.
The first two matches were won by the Proteas absolutely convincingly. The Blues gave a tough competition in the 3rd ODI and were in fact in a winning position. But the South African bowlers turned the match in their favor in the death overs after the fall of Deepak Chahar’s wicket.
BCCI will obviously assess the performance of the players to find out what went wrong and make necessary changes in the squad for the upcoming set of series. In this article we shall do the same and analyze the performance of each Indian player that took part in the ODI series against South Africa and rate them accordingly out of 10.
Team India’s Player Ratings out of 10 (Based on performances in ODI series against South Africa)
Batsmen
1. KL Rahul – 3/10
KL Rahul scored a total of 76 runs in the ODI series against South Africa with the highest score of 55. Based on the form that the opener is currently in, it must be considered as a poor performance on his part. Moreover he made way too many mistakes as the Team’s Captain for which India had to suffer and thus he gets a rating of 3 out of 10. His performance in the Test series was way better.
2. Virat Kohli – 6/10
Virat Kohli was the second highest run scorer for India in the ODI series against South Africa. He scored 51 runs in the first ODI and 65 off 84 in the third ODI while making a duck in the second match. However the former Indian skipper looked very promising in this series and showed signs that he would return to his best form soon.
3. Shikhar Dhawan – 9/10
Undoubtedly the best performer in the series against South Africa. He was India’s highest runs scorer (169 runs) and he was consistent in every single match. He scored 79, 29 and 61 runs respectively in the three matches and proved his haters wrong in the series. After a stellar performance against South Africa, the selectors are bound to consider bringing Shikhar Dhawan back to India’s international setup.
4. Shreyas Iyer – 2/10
Shreyas Iyer’s performance in the series was very disappointing. He had been phenomenal in the Test series against New Zealand and much more was expected of him. Sadly he scored just 54 runs in the entire series and failed to impress the netizens.
5. Suryakumar Yadav – 4/10
Suryakumar Yadav played only in the third ODI and scored 39 runs. He was quite good but just one match is not a good enough domain to judge him and thus he gets a rating of 4. It is a big question mark as to why Suryakumar Yadav was not utilized in the first two matches but after this, he will definitely be considered by Rahul Dravid in the upcoming series.
6. Rishabh Pant – 5/10
Rishabh Pant scored a brilliant knock of 85 runs in the second match but that was pretty much it from his part. He failed to impress in the other two matches although he was good at the back of the wicket. His position in the team, however, remains secure as India do not have any proper replacement for Rishabh Pant in all the formats. Although Ishan Kishan is an option, he is highly inconsistent.
All-rounders
7. Venkatesh Iyer – 1/10
Perhaps the worst performer of Team India in the ODI series against South Africa. After his brilliant knocks in IPL 2021 and domestic cricket, Venkatesh Iyer got his maiden call up from the national team but so far he has failed to impress at the International level. Iyer scored just 24 runs in total and picked up zero wickets.
8. Ravichandran Ashwin – 2.5/10
With the South Africa series, Ravichandran Ashwin made his return to ODI cricket after 5 years but unfortunately he failed to impress. He scored 32 runs in 2 matches and picked up only 1 wicket.
9. Deepak Chahar – 9/10
Deepak Chahar played just one match in the entire series but just killed it in that single match. He picked up 2 big wickets in the third ODI and played a sensational knock of 54 runs.
Bowlers
10. Shardul Thakur – 5/10
Shardul Thakur failed to impress with the ball as he picked up only 1 wicket in the series but his cameo performances with the bat made things even. He scored 90 runs in the series and was unbeaten throughout.
11. Bhuvneshwar Kumar – 2/10
Bhuvneshwar Kumar was very poor in the series. He failed to pick up any wicket and was also very expensive. He played two matches. Bhuvneshwar Kumar has now had a series of successive failures in a row and this will probably mark the end of his International career.
12. Yuzvendra Chahal – 3/10
Yuzvendra Chahal played all three matches but picked up 2 wickets. However his economy rate was good and thus he shall not fall in the category of flops of India’s ODI series against South Africa. His performance was good enough for the selectors to consider him for the upcoming series as well.
13. Jasprit Bumrah – 8/10
As expected, Jasprit Bumrah was once agains the torch bearer of India’s bowling unit in the South Africa series and he was their best bowler. Bumrah picked up 5 wickets in the three matches and his economy rate was very good too. He picked up at least 1 wicket in every match and was the most consistent of the lot.
14. Prasidh Krishna – 7/10
Prasidh Krishna played only in the third ODI but impressed the netizens a lot. He was able to pick up 3 wickets near the end of South Africa’s innings and surprisingly became the second highest wicket taker of India in the series by playing only 1 match.
15. Jayant Yadav – 2/10
Jayant Yadav played only in the 3rd ODI between India and South Africa and he was wicketless. However he was fairly economical and thus he was not that poor.
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