Veteran cricketer Suresh Raina chalked out mystery spinner Varun Chakravarthy as the key player for Team India in the T20 World Cup, which started from Sunday. 

Justifying his pick, Raina said the conditions in UAE and Oman are spin friendly, adding Chakravarthy has shown qualities of mixing his pace brilliantly on these tracks. 

“My experience in the IPL was that the wickets in UAE and Oman will be very, very challenging when it comes to the mystery spinners. That makes Varun Chakravarthy the main guy in the India bowling attack. He has showed he can exploit the pace of the pitches. Varun has only played three T20Is but I’m not concerned by any lack of experience,” Raina wrote in his column for ICC. 

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Raina also believes the addition of his Chennai Super Kings teammate Shardul Thakur will provide Virat Kohli with extra depth in the seam department. 

“There is plenty of experience in this team, particularly in the seam attack. Bhuvneshwar Kumar in particular leads the way when it comes to experience and knowledge of how to deal with the big games,” said Raina.

“The inclusion of Shardul Thakur can also give extra strength to the fast bowlers that Virat has at his disposal. We have been waiting for this T20 World Cup for a long time. It has been a difficult two years but I think we’re about to see something special in the UAE and Oman,” he added.

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Both Chakravarthy and Thakur had a supreme outing in the recently concluded Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021, with the spinner emerging as the leading wicket-taker from KKR camp. 

Chakravarthy scalped a total of 18 wickets from 17 matches, while Thakur picked 21 wickets from 16 outings. 

India will kick-off their campaign in the World Cup against Pakistan on October 24.