I want these players to put themselves under pressure – Morne Morkel
As the clock ticks down to the first ODI between India and West Indies in Thiruvananthapuram, one of the major topics eliciting conversation is around the Men in Blue’s potential playing XI.
India’s bowling coach, Morne Morkel, made it clear that a lot of calls will be taken keeping the 2027 ICC World Cup in mind.
Morkel further added that the players will have to subject themselves to pressure in order to gear up for situations which might arise at any time, and how they fare under the pump is what will decide who is given a spot in the XI.
Talking at the pre-match presser, Morkel said, “Look, for me, the main focus I reckon would be: we can talk and you can look at different options, how you want to go about playing XI. But for me, the end of the day is that whoever walks onto the field now, up until the World Cup, starting on Sunday, needs to know that there's a certain standard we want to achieve. I want these players to put themselves under pressure, as much pressure.”
He further added, “I think coming to the World Cup on the biggest stage, you can't decide a month or a week before the tournament that now we're going to step things up. I think it starts now with this series against West Indies, how, with bat, ball and in the field, we put ourselves under pressure.”
Highlighting the expectations from the management, Morkel added, “I want to see guys going to Shubman and asking for the ball and wanting to create the wicket opportunities and not be sort of protecting their own space. I think that will be a great goal for us. You know, if we are maybe 30 for 4, who's going to go and get that partnership and get us to 100? So if we can throw ourselves in certain situations and guys can figure out ways how to play those situations and learn and take learnings about that, there will be growth and that will help us down the line."
Morkel also shed some light on the workload management, stating, “We're constantly keeping an eye on workload management, how to give the guys the best opportunity to be fit and put their name in the hat for selection. We've got Hardik, we've got Harshit Rana, all those guys still on the sidelines and we're excited to get them back and get them playing and get them fit again. So that's part of our job to sit with the medical side and map that out.”
He concluded by talking about the individuals and the roles that are being tagged, saying, "But there's definitely a plan for each and every individual and we'll keep on monitoring that and coming up with the best way forward to give the selectors and to give everybody the best sort of group to pick from."
