Team India batsman Shreyas Iyer recalled his favorite shot from the game ODI World Cup 2023ahead of the return of Men in Blue to the format. The middle-order player has been selected in the ODI squad to face England in a three-match series, before competing for the Champions Trophy in 2025.
Iyer picked his half-century against Sri Lanka in the league stage at the Wankhede Stadium as his favorite knock of the entire tournament. The right-handed batsman scored at a strike rate of 146.63, smashing six sixes to help India post a dominant total of 357-8 on the board.
In reply, Sri Lanka were bowled out for a paltry 55, giving India a 302-run win as they continued their winning streak throughout the campaign.
Iyer revealed that the strike was crucial as the pressure was on him to keep his place in the playing XI.
“82 against Sri Lanka. Because there was a lot of talk about me being dropped from the team and not giving much to the team. Even though I scored 50 against Pakistan, there were some talks that put me in a carefree situation, that’s the kind of (talk) triggered my instincts from within,” Iyer said during the Exchange of Ideas (via The Indian Express).
Iyer endured a weak first half World Cup, starting with a three-ball duck against Australia. He came back strongly, scoring two fifties and two hundreds in the last four matches of the championship stage. The batsman finished with 530 runs at an average of 66.25.
Iyer further added that criticism from outside can sometimes be ‘irritating’.
“It’s irritating, especially when it comes from people, who haven’t faced a 150km an hour delivery, who advise you to play a certain way. But I would say that’s their opinion. They have every right to talk, but they can talk between himself and not directly with the player,” Iyer added.
The batsman was constantly bombarded with questions regarding his problems against the short ball. He attacked a reporter for the same during a press conference, right after the aforementioned defeat against Sri Lanka in the 2023 ODI World Cup.
“The hardest phase was my back injury” – Shreyas Iyer
Shreyas Iyer has been dealing with a chronic back problem, due to which he has been sustaining injuries on a regular basis. With this inconsistency affecting his form and jeopardizing his place in the Indian team in the long run, he decided to undergo surgery on the same.
He went under the knife in April 2023 after an injury during the Border-Gavaskar series, causing him to miss the entire Indian Premier League (IPL) the World Test Championship (WTC) campaign and final.
“The most difficult phase was my back injury. When I had the operation, I thought that this would completely change my body. And it was kind of difficult to get back to the same zone and agility that I had before the operation. After a year, now I feel very comfortable and I feel strong that I can do what I set out to do before the surgery,” Iyer said (according to the source mentioned above).
Iyer eventually made a comeback in the 2023 Asia Cup and had a prolific run after that.
Edited by Nihal
