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Originally Posted by Gowza
i think it comes down to circumstance as it has done in tests and i don't think it's a coincidence. riyad has basically shot himself in the foot by being unwilling to move up the order, he's limited himself to batting in positions where it comes down to team dynamic and selection.
i would really like to know what's going on in his head, does he really think they'll always select a batsman/batting all rounder for the #8 position? maybe he thinks he's just that good that they can't pass him up (in which case he's wrong), or maybe he's just so stubborn that's the only place he'll agree to bat. in any case it's unrealistic to consistently have a batsman/batting all rounder at #8 every match, if that is really where he wants to play then he's going to have to do a lot of hard work with his bowling so that he can compete with other specialist spinners.
unless he believes they'll pick him ahead of the likes of nasir and shakib....i just don't see any logic to why he won't bat higher up the order, and the thing is the longer he keeps this attitude the more the gap closes for him to actually find a spot in the team. his only option now is pretty much the #3 spot or transforming into an opener. he could get the #7 spot in ODIs but for that they have to bat mominul/naeem or whoever at #3 then move mushy, shakib and nasir up the order, which is quite possible but there is also a chance that they pick both mominul and naeem, play them at 3/4 and drop riyad.
naeem can easily be used in a similar fashion to riyad on the bowling front, their records are pretty similar except riyad has just played more, however on the batting front naeem is willing to bat up the order and riyad isn't so that could be the deciding factor of his fate despite having a good batting record in his last few matches.
i think they'll probably play mominul at 3, then have shakib, mushy, nasir (in whatever order) allowing riyad to hold his place for now, but if riyad is to have a dip in form then they could tag him out for naeem.
the main difference between riyad and naeem is that naeem will bat up and riyad won't, the other difference is riyad has a better ODI batting record than naeem, but with nasir being such a successful lower order bat i don't think the selectors, team management, captain would hesitate to put nasir at 7 with mushy and shakib above him and have naeem/mominul in the 3 and 4 positions if riyad was to dip in form. if that was to happen riyad's spot would then come down to whether naeem could secure his spot or not.
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I think Riyad's unwilling to move up to for Tests. In ODIs I think he's fine with moving up. I remember he said he's willing to bat wherever the team wants him to for ODIs. It's just Tests where he doesn't want to bat that high. He batted there against Pakistan in 2011 although he wasn't persisted at 3.
I agree though, we can easily have Naeem in since he's more willing to bat up the order and can do similar things Riyad can. So we could drop everyone down and then have Naeem and Mominul in.
I'm fine with either tbh but since Mushy, Shakib, Nasir and Riyad have worked out well for us in that order, my question is should we change it? Instead of 2 unproven batsmen, we'd be throwing in 3 at the expense of Riyad.
If it was up to me, I'd keep it the way it is and have. Mominul bat at 3 which would mean Naeem would unfortunately have to miss out.
1 good thing is that we can afford to be flexible nowadays which we couldn't say before.