IPL 2020 | Manoj Tiwary picks Rohit Sharma as captain of his IPL XI; leaves Virat Kohli out

Now that IPL 2020 is done and dusted, each and every cricket expert is putting out their IPL XIs, much like the fans and everyone who closely followed the league, which was a big hit. Cricket expert and Indian batsman Manoj Tiwary picked his special IPL XI and left everyone surprised as he picked Rohit Sharma as the opener stating, that the MI skipper needs to be in the team for his captaincy. Rohit had made 332 runs in 12 games at 27.66 with a strike-rate under 130, with the likes of Dhawan, Kock and Mayank having a bumper season at the top, bettering his figures by some distance.

Tiwary chose KL Rahul, the orange cap holder with 670 runs in 14 games, as Rohit's opening partner followed by Suryakumar Yadav, who he reckons is India's 360 player, ahead of Virat Kohli. He then picked the dangerous AB de Villiers, who shone through with 454 runs at a strike-rate of 158.74, claiming that the South African can bat explosively in any situation and is an international 360-degree player.

He picked MI's trio of Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard and Krunal Pandya as his 5th, 6th and 7th batting options in the XI. While Hardik and Pollard were straightforward picks, for Krunal he stated that the southpaw provides a good spin all-round option. Notably, Washington Sundar had done far better than Krunal Pandya with the ball.

Tiwary's bowling attack comprised three specialist pacers Jofra Archer, Jasprit Bumrah and T Natarajan, while he picked Rashid Khan ahead of Yuzvendra Chahal, given the former's great control over leg-breaks and googlies. Interestingly, Tiwary picked Natarajan over the likes of Trent Boult, Kagiso Rabada, and Anrich Nortje. Rabada was the purple cap holder as he scalped 30 wickets in 17 games while Boult was third best in terms of wickets, with 25 wickets, followed by Nortje, who had 22 wickets to his credit. T Natarajan took 16 wickets in as many games and emerged as a Yorker King this season.

Tiwary's IPL XI - Rohit (C), KL Rahul, Suryakumar Yadav, AB de Villiers, Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, Jofra Archer, Jasprit Bumrah, Rashid Khan, T Natarajan