India vs Australia | Shikhar Dhawan’s record in multi-nation tournaments is ‘fabulous’, says Aakash Chopra

Dhawan averages only 26.85 since the last Asia Cup in September as he has scored a mere 376 runs in 15 innings after the tournament. The left-hander is now a cause of concern for the team management as there are only three international games remaining ahead of the grand event. In the recent series against the Aussies, the left-hander has scores of 0 and 21 in the first two games.

However, former Test opener Chopra is of the opinion that he will get back to form soon and reminded the fact that the Delhi left-hander has got good numbers in multi-nation tournaments. 

"There is no denying Dhawan is going through a bad patch but with only three international matches left, I don't see any drastic changes happening. If he has scored 5000 plus ODI runs (5199 from 125 games), it means that he has been around for a reasonable period of time, seen ups and downs to have scored that many runs. His record in multi-nation tournaments (World Cup, Champions Trophy, Asia Cup) is fabulous, so it could well be a matter of time that he is back in form," Chopra told PTI.

With the return of KL Rahul in the squad, India gave the Karnataka batsman two T20I games against Australia where he scored runs to prove his worth in the playing XI. Rohit Sharma had opened the innings with his in Vizag while in Bengaluru it was Dhawan who was asked to do the same. Chopra, however, wanted to see Rahul playing all the limited-overs matches with Rohit and Dhawan being rotated for the opening slot.

"Had they split these matches (2 T20s and 5 ODIs) into seven games with 4 matches for Shikhar and 3 for Rohit with Rahul playing all seven, there could have been that possibility. But that didn't happen," said Chopra.

The former Indian Test opener, who is also a part of the commentary team has also opined that Dhawan had a good chance of playing Ranji Trophy for Delhi while India was in Australia as the left-hander was not a part of the Test side. According to Chopra, this decision could have helped Dhawan as well as Indian domestic cricket.

"He exactly didn't set the stage on fire against West Indies at home and since he was not in Test side against Australia, he could have come back and played Ranji Trophy. It would have helped him as well as our domestic cricket. But that didn't happen."