Playing with international players in IPL gives a huge boost, says Shikhar Dhawan

Shikhar Dhawan returned to the Indian squad after missing out on the ODI series and played a small and significant role in guiding the side to victory in the first T20I game against Australia on Saturday. It was yet another holistic performance by the Indians as they swept aside Australia completely in all departments.

Youngsters in the Indian side like Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jasprit Bumrah, Hardik Pandya, Manish Pandey among others have been sharing the dressing rooms with stalwarts like Brag Hodge, Kieron Pollard, David Warner, Darren Bravo, Jacques Kallis and many more, sharing ideas and strategies, which have helped them grow over the past few years.

“Our team is very strong. We have been doing well for a long time. We have some good youngsters as well as experienced players. You really get a good boost when you perform well with International players in the IPL,” said Dhawan.

Dhawan feels it is time India set themselves the target to emulating the success of the all-conquering Australian side of the 2000s.

“The youngsters are maturing well… Our bench strength is strong with the likes of Ajinkya Rahane who did so well in the ODIs, then there’s KL Rahul and Murali Vijay in Tests so it’s a good sign for India… In today’s era most of the teams are on level par. It would be a great thing if we can achieve what Australians did earlier,” he added.

The Ranchi pitch was definitely a huge deciding factor in Australia’s downfall. Its low bounce saw many Australian batsmen failing to read the length completely, which saw numerous bowled on Saturday. Though tricky, India had got their task reduced by the hour-long rain interruption, which set the revised target at 48 runs from six overs that India chased it quite comfortably.

However, Dhawan believes that India would have won easily if they were to chase the full target of 118 runs in 20 overs. The opener believes they wouldn’t have any problem with the pitch.

“The target was not that big. Yes, the wicket had low bounce but we are used to the conditions here. We could have chased easily,” he said.

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