India have almost every base covered, but No. 8 issue persists

There is so much specialist T20 talent in India that barring a few unique or multi-skilled players, India can pick just about any other set and dominate 20-overs cricket. When these players - Jasprit Bumrah, Kuldeep Yadav, Varun Chakravarthy, Hardik Pandya and Axar Patel - are fit and available, there are no wrong choices for five other slots. However, there is one key position that India still struggle with, which we will come back to.

It is in this light that we should look at India's squad for the Asia Cup. India won the 2024 T20 World Cup without dropping a single match, and have only gone from strength to strength since that campaign. In this latest selection, they have reinforced their opening combination even more.

Shubman Gill, who was vice-captain the last time he played T20Is before being rested with India prioritising other formats, is back as vice-captain. This pretty much says he will be opening the batting with Abhishek Sharma. Sanju Samson has not done much wrong as opener in the chances he has got, but Gill seems to be the better T20 batter, which can be seen in his strike rate of 155.87 with medium-risk batting in IPL 2025.

As with any selection for India's T20I sides, there will always be batters desperately unfortunate to miss out. Yashasvi Jaiswal is the man in this case. In his absence, Abhishek has shown an even higher ceiling of attack, and some useful part-time bowling. Samson provides a wicketkeeping option. Gill offers India a right-left combination with Abhishek, and, as Test captain, is ideally placed to extend his leadership role as and when that time comes.

Shreyas Iyer must have been a temptation after his successful IPL 2025 with Punjab Kings, but it is understandable if the selectors have chosen to stick with the incumbent Tilak Varma for now. It gives India two left-hand and two right-hand batters in the top four. Should Tilak happen to fall into some kind of rut, India have Samson, who can bat at No. 3. If Samson plays and keeps wickets, India have the room to pick a middle-order hitter other than Jitesh Sharma should they so choose.

Bumrah, Kuldeep, Varun and Arshdeep Singh pick themselves in the 15-member squad, although only three of them can play together at a given point of time. Which brings us to the next unfortunate player to miss out, and India's only weakness in T20Is. Prasidh Krishna could not be part of the squad because India want a No. 8 who can hit sixes. Prasidh had a great IPL 2025, with 25 wickets and an economy rate of 8.27, but India can't repeat the mistake his IPL side Gujarat Titans kept making: play Rashid Khan at No. 7 with no batting behind him.

Harshit Rana is yet to translate his batting ability into numbers. His T20 and List A strike rates are 105.35 and 75.7, respectively. He does, however, average 32.8 in first-class cricket at a healthy strike rate of 82.68. He has hit 27 sixes in 595 balls in first-class cricket. It is on this promise that Harshit gets in ahead of Prasidh. If he comes off as a No. 8 batter, it frees India up to play both their mystery spinners, with Harshit and Hardik as the second and third quicks.

If Harshit's batting doesn't come off, though, India's weakness with bowlers who can't hit will persist, which could force their specialist batters to dial down the aggression a notch. In the longer run, India could then perhaps need to look at Vipraj Nigam, who hit eight sixes in 79 balls in IPL 2025, and bowled 39 overs at an economy rate of 9.12.

India have another option: weaken the bowling, and play Shivam Dube. That would leave him, Hardik, Axar and Abhishek to bowl eight overs among them. That also means one of the mystery spinners sits out, unless the pitch is ragging.

Overall, India have only become more robust as a T20I side with this selection while retaining the core that makes domination possible. There will be quite a few opportunities between now and the World Cup early next year to fine-tune the batting roles and the odd bowling position. There's no reason for those who have missed out to be despondent just yet.

India's likely first XI: 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Shubman Gill (vc), 3 Tilak Varma, 4 Suryakumar Yadav (capt), 5 Jitesh Sharma (wk), 6 Hardik Pandya, 7 Axar Patel, 8 Harshit Rana, 9 Kuldeep Yadav, 10 Jasprit Bumrah, 11 Varun Chakravarthy.

Back-ups: Sanju Samson, Rinku Singh, Shivam Dube, Arshdeep Singh.