With Harbhajan Singh official confirming his unavailability during this IPL, a lot of debate has been going around on who should be the chosen one to fill his spot?
Former India wicket-keeper and batsman Deep Dasgupta believes CSK should consider an all-rounder cricketer like Jalaj Saxena to replace Harbhajan Singh. In an interview, he said, “I think Jalaj Saxena deserves a place, he’s a good enough all-rounder. I think they might look at him, he’s a very good option for Bhajji’s replacement,”
DasGupta further added, “He’s someone who has got a lot of experience not just in red-ball cricket but also in white-ball cricket he’s been around for a while,”
Jalaj Saxena is an old-timer when we look at the Indian Domestic Cricket and has a proven track record in all three formats of the game i.e., test, T-20, and ODI.
DasGupta even went far and mentioned some of Jalaj Saxena’s drawback in comparison to Bhajji and said, “Yes, he wasn‘t a regularity, didn’t play all the games last season but having said that when you’ve got someone as experienced as Harbhajan and we’re talking about all those 50 plus matches being played on only 3 venues,”
“In the 2nd half of the tournament, those pitches will get tired, there will ware and tare so it will definitely help the spinners. From the experience part, yes (they will miss him), and of course he was only off-spinner. He didn’t play much after last season but with someone of that experience, you have to back them and that’s what CSK has done. So, they will miss him, maybe not too much but a bit for sure.”
Comparing CSK’s off-spinner Harbhajan Singh to a veteran cricketer like Jalaj Saxena is a very unique comparison to make and can only be done after we look at the statistics of the two and give time to analyze the pros and also the cons.