Courage, hand-eye coordination, shots make Shaw the Sehwag 2.0

By Khurram Habib

New Delhi, July 19 (SocialNews.XYZ) Prithvi Shaw's 24-ball 43 that included nine, well-timed boundaries brought out comparisons with former India opener Virender Sehwag, who himself tweeted a picture of himself, Sachin Tendulkar, and Brian Lara and wrote, "Pehle 5.3 overs hamara jalwa raha (in the first 5.3 overs, it was our charisma)".

Shaw's shots through the off-side -- his first four was a punch through extra cover while the second one was a cut through point -- were quite similar to what Sehwag would hit during his playing days.

Shaw hit a few more, through mid-wicket, and again through extra-cover and point.

While Sehwag hinted Shaw was reminded of himself, the former India team opener's coach and mentor AN Sharma said he could find some similarities.

"He has the jigra (courage), which Sehwag had. I always like a player who makes offence his defence, not his defence as offence," said Sharma to IANS.

"All his shots on the off-side were beautiful. Sehwag used to hit similar shots," added Sharma.

Former India batsman Pravin Amre, who has worked with Shaw on his footwork after the Test series in Australia and during IPL says that people are drawing comparisons because of the impact he makes.

"You saw that yesterday. He made 43 while the other guy, Shikhar Dhawan scored 86 (not out) but still, Shaw got the man of the match. I think it is the impact of his innings for which people are comparing him with Sehwag. Hand-eye coordination is what made Sehwag great and that is what Shaw has," Amre told IANS.

"Basically, he is a shadow of Sehwag, he is a shadow of Lara because of his high backlift and if he gets consistency, he will be a shadow of Tendulkar. During the IPL, we worked with his footwork because if the footwork is there, he will be more consistent," added Amre.

But Amre warned against going too much into comparisons.

"It is not easy to be in Sehwag's shoes. Sehwag got a triple in Test matches not once but twice. But yes, you get a glimpse of Sehwag in him. But for us [coaches and ex-cricketers] it is difficult to compare, because he has his own style," said Amre further.

Sehwag's coach Sharma, however, said that there are some differences.

"No two batsmen can be the same. You would agree with it," said Sharma.

"Sehwag would start to move the moment he would see the ball getting released. I have been watching Shaw minutely. He is not that perfect [in that]," added Sharma.

Sharma also talked of differences due to Sehwag's experience of having played more overseas.

"Though Sehwag used to hit similar shots, he never used to go so low. His bat's sweet spot was slightly higher. It comes out of habit, when you play abroad, you have to keep the sweet spot a bit above," said Sharma.

Source: IANS