File photo of Ravichandran Ashwin.© X (formerly Twitter)
Rinku Singh has certainly left no stone unturned to cement his place into the T20I team of India. Across 15 games and 11 innings in T20Is, Rinku has scored 356 runs at an average of 89 and a strike rate of over 176 with two half-centuries. He has been making a name for himself as a finisher for the national team. While praising the batter for his heroics against Afghanistan in the third T20I match, another India star Ravichandran Ashwin said that Rinku is a left-handed MS Dhoni.
“He is somebody I’d call a left-handed Dhoni. I can’t compare him to Dhoni just yet because Dhoni is too big. But, I am talking about the composure that he brings. He has been consistently scoring buckets of runs for UP and broke his way into the Indian team,” Ashwin said on his YouTube channel.
“(Rinku has) showed that he’s always available to get to the Indian team out of a tricky situation or finish an innings. The composure doesn’t change whether the team is batting first or chasing. His composure towards the back end of the innings is a bonus,” he added.
Rinku played a crucial role in India’s win over Afghanistan in the third T20I in Bengaluru.
A winner for the India vs Afghanistan third T20I was decided through not one but two Super Overs. Both the teams had their scores tied at 212 after which the contest went into a Super Over. The thriller never faded as the Super Over too ended in a tie, taking the game to yet another Super Over where the Rohit Sharma-led side edge past its opponent.
Earlier, Rohit and Rinku stitched a breathtaking 190-run stand to help India post a mammoth total 212 for 4 on the bouncy track of Bengaluru. Rohit scored 121 not out off 69 while Rinku contributed with 69 not out off 39 after the India skipper won the toss and opted to bat. Afghanistan came out with a superb reply and managed to level the scores by the end, thanks to Gulbadin Naib‘s fighting 55 off 23.
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