Wasim Jaffer has supported the idea of Sanju Samson replacing Suryakumar Yadav in the Indian team’s lineup ahead of the 2023 World Cup. Jaffer made the statement following Suryakumar’s third successive golden duck in the series against Australia on Wednesday.
Mitchell Starc dismissed Suryakumar Yadav for a golden duck in the first two ODIs played in Mumbai and Visakhapatnam, respectively. In the series decider against Australia, left-arm spinner Ashton Agar clean bowled him on the first ball of his innings. Wasim Jaffer expressed his sympathy towards Yadav’s situation and suggested that Sanju Samson should replace him in the playing eleven. With Shreyas Iyer out of the team due to injury for the next five months, a vacancy in the middle-order has opened up.
“I would probably sympathise with him. It doesn’t happen with probably a number eleven batter. It’s one of those things that you get out for a golden duck three times in a row. It probably would never happen to him again, hopefully. It’s just a bad luck to him. But I think India need to look somewhere else,” Jaffer told ESPNcricinfo.
“Even though he is a quality player, he would come out pretty good as the IPL will start and he will be in his element. But India needs to look at Sanju Samson or somewhere else and still stick with Surya because he is a quality player. “If he comes good, we all know he is a quality player and so you just don’t need to keep him aside. If IPL goes well, we will be tempted to play him again but India need to look at Sanju Samson as well,” he added.
Sanju Samson had an impressive start comapered to Sky
In his last 10 ODI innings, Suryakumar Yadav has scored 8, 4, 34*, 6, 4, 31, 14, 0, 0, 0. Throughout his ODI career, the 32-year-old has played in 23 matches and scored 433 runs with an average of 24.05 and a strike rate of 102.12. In contrast, Sanju Samson has amassed 330 runs in 11 matches with an average of 66 and a strike rate of 104.76. In his last five ODI matches, Samson has scored 36, 2*, 30*, 86*, and 15. The 28-year-old last played an ODI match in November 2022. Jaffer has expressed his support for Samson to replace Suryakumar Yadav in the ODI team, given the former’s impressive performance and the vacant spot in the middle order due to the injury of Shreyas Iyer.
