India lost the fourth T20 International between them and New Zealand by a dismal margin of 50 runs in Visakhapatnam. The IND vs NZ game pointed out one of the key issues of Team India leading to the T20 World Cup the excessive reliance on some of the star batters.
India had a terrible start with a huge target of 216 runs. The team lost two very vital wickets with only 9 runs. Matt Henry dismissed Abhishek Sharma on his very first ball, and Suryakumar Yadav was not far behind him, he made only 8 scores.
The batters of the Indian people made a but fruitless effort to recover after the initial failure, and the rate at which they needed to run increased. The inning was later terminated at 165 runs in 18.4 overs. No other batter was able to score more than 25 runs except Shivam Dube and Rinku Singh.
Shivam Dube struck solidly with 65 runs with only 23 balls and Rinku Singh scored 39 runs with only 30 balls. India, nevertheless, failed by far to reach the goal and lost the match at a comfortable level.
The IND vs NZ fourth T20 demonstrated the dependence of India on Abhishek Sharma and Suryakumar Yadav. As soon as both of them collapsed, the rest of the batting line-up was unable to withstand the pressure of a big chase. This is an alarming indicator prior to the T20 World Cup.
Even though both Abhishek and Suryakumar have done well in general in the series, including scoring runs, and hitting half-centuries, the team can not rely on them alone in big tournaments.
In India, the middle order and lower order batters should also be responsible to ensure that the country succeeds in the T20 World Cup 2026. In case the load continues to be on the upper two, good teams will take advantage of this weakness.
