India's potential T20I line up going into the future

Openers

Who should be Rohit Sharma's opening partner?

Rohit Sharma might have been a liability for India in tests, but when it comes to the limited overs formats, Rohit is right there at the top with Virat Kohli as India’s best batsman. He is an automatic choice to open the innings for team India in T20Is. But his opening partner is a concern for the team.

In spite of getting a lot of chances in the T20 format, Shikhar Dhawan has failed to prove himself and is highly inconsistent with the bat. 416 runs at an average of 22 and a strike-rate of just over 113 are not good numbers for an opener in T20Is. Ajinkya Rahane’s numbers look similar to that of Dhawan and at times, Rahane slows down the scoring rate of the team, which is not the right way to approach the batting in this format.

On the other hand, KL Rahul showed a lot of promise in the very few T20Is he has played. Even in the IPL, Rahul was one of the shining stars for his team, Royal Challengers Bangalore. Though he has played a majority of his T20 innings in the middle order, he himself has revealed that he likes to open the innings in this format.

He is not new to this role and Rahul opening alongside Rohit will allow the latter to play his natural game and bat as long as possible.

Opening batsmen: Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul