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India's Harshit Rana bowls during the one day international cricket match between Australia and India in Perth Australia, Sunday, Oct. 19, 2025. (David Woodley/AAPImage via AP)
Former Indian cricketer Aakash Chopra came to the rescue of Harshit Rana. The young fast bowler has come under criticism from a few former players and the netizens online, who questioned his position in the Indian squad. Chopra backed Rana and questioned his critique of how many bowlers in the current Indian fast bowling lot are considered all-format?
“Let’s not get carried away yet. He doesn’t deserve the hate. It’s not his mistake. If you have to give hate, give it to someone else, and not to him, because he is not asking for him to be selected. You select him and he comes and plays. He tries to win the match, and whether he is able to do that or not is a separate issue,” Chopra said.
“It will happen. Let’s make a long list of fast bowlers who are close to the Indian team – (Mohammed) Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Harshit Rana at the moment, Arshdeep Singh, Jasprit Bumrah and Akash Deep. Who else? Mohammad Shami and Bhuvneshwar Kumar are not there,” Chopra said on YouTube.
“We have forgotten Umran Malik. Khaleel (Ahmed) can come, but he is not your Test kind of bowler. Deepak Chahar, Shardul Thakur, Tushar Deshpande, Mayank Yadav, Prince Yadav, T Natarajan – whose name should I take? When you see this list, it’s not like you have a dozen bowlers standing ready. You don’t have that many. That’s why the team feels that they should back Harshit Rana if he has that game,” he added.
“If someone has played more in front of a coach, captain or selector, they see more potential in him and want to back him. Sourav Ganguly also backed some players. Eventually some of them became the legends of the game. Similarly, Dhoni backed many players. They became legends of the game. Virat Kohli also backed someone. Now Shubman Gill will also back someone,” Chopra concluded.
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