What changes should India make in their T20I setup to return to winning ways?

India faced a humiliating 4-0 whitewash against England in the T20I series recently.

Earlier in March, the Indian Cricket Team earned accolades from global cricket fans by becoming the first team to defend their T20 World Cup title. The Men in Blue won the 2026 edition by beating New Zealand in the final by 96 runs.

However, now, just three months later, India suffered two big blows in the shortest format. To begin with, they suffered a 0-2 whitewash against Ireland in June, followed by a disappointing 4-0 defeat against England in a five-match series in July.

Shockingly, the Shreyas Iyer & Co. suffered a defeat in a bilateral series for the first time since winning the T20 World Cup 2024. Also, Ireland outplayed them for the first time in international cricket, while England registered one-sided victories in all four games, overpowering the Men in Blue in both bowling and batting departments.

The Indian management needs to analyse the causes behind India’s disastrous campaigns and execute significant steps to strengthen the T20I team. On that note, below are three major changes India should make to return to winning ways in the T20I setup.

3 changes India need to do to strengthen their T20I squad

3. Adapt conditions instead of going after bowlers from 1st over

Over the last few years, many teams have adapted the approach of attacking the opposition bowlers from the first over itself. Even the Indian Cricket Team introduced this approach a few years back under Rohit Sharma’s captaincy, which also helped them to win back-to-back T20 World Cup titles.

Although this aggressive batting approach helps the team reach mammoth totals in many games, it also leads to batting collapses on a few occasions. While trying to go for big shots, key batters often lose their wickets cheaply, which twists the game in the opposition’s favour.

Something similar happened in the Ireland and England tours, where despite having achievable targets in a few games, Indian batters suffered batting collapses.

The ‘Attack is the best Defence’ approach does not work everywhere, especially in overseas conditions. Instead of going after bowlers from the first delivery, batters should understand the pitch conditions and play accordingly.

2. Add some right-handers in the mix to maintain left-right combination

India’s T20I squad against Ireland and England had a lot of left-handers in the top and middle-order. For instance, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Tilak Varma, Abhishek Sharma, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, and Ishan Kishan were all left-handers, while Shreyas Iyer, Sanju Samson, and Suryansh Shedge were the only three right-handed batters.

Such batting line-up makes it easier for opposition to plan by using same tactics against left-handers. In the upcoming campaigns, the management should add more right-handers to the squad so that the team can maintain a good left-right combination.

1. Take hard calls on some players and bring in Rajat Patidar and other performers into T20I side

A few experienced players like Samson, Tilak Varma, Shivam Dube, Axar Patel, and Ishan Kishan could not come up with consistent performance in both series.

For instance, despite returning to the T20I side after two years, skipper Shreyas Iyer finished as the leading run-scorer against England with 218 runs. With an average of 54.50 and a strike rate of 157, he impressed with his batting. However, other key members failed to come up with good performance despite being regular members of the T20I side over the last few years.

Since the management has already followed a transition in the T20I team, they should take some more hard calls and drop a few under performers from the squad. Also, they should bring in batters like Rajat Patidar, Sai Sudharsan, and Yashasvi Jaiswal, who have impressed with their performance in the last few editions of the Indian Premier League (IPL).

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