England vs India 2018: 5 players who may not live up to the expectations

#2 Hardik Pandya

Hardik Pandya has become extremely popular with the Indian public, and fans want him to be part of every Indian playing XI, irrespective of the format. He has shown tremendous improvement and has honed his skills to become the world-class all-rounder he today is. However, he does have technical issues to deal with, and being in England, the fast bowlers will put his technique to test and he will have to challenge himself to bat for longer periods of time in testing conditions.

His bowling too is yet to be tested on seam-friendly surfaces. In conditions where other fast bowlers would look to swing the ball and try and make the ball do a bit, he might have to struggle due to his inability to generate genuine swing. Till now, he had been mostly bowling in Indian conditions and hardly did one get to see him bowl a full quota of overs, but in England, he will have to bowl 10 overs in ODIs more often than not. The escape route he used while being hammered when playing in India, was to pitch it short and get some bounce, but that might not work out very well on English pitches. Looking towards the World Cup next year, Hardik will have to adapt to playing in English conditions and develop himself into a more resilient all-rounder.