Andre Russell Weakness Against Short Balls

Andre Russell Struggle Against Short Ball:

West Indies allrounder Andre Russell is a top T20 specialist player. He is a good batsman, a good bowler and an energetic fielder. Due to his recent superb form in T20, every Twenty20 league franchise in different part of the world would wish to hire him for their team. However, in past 1 year, seam bowlers have identified some technical flaws in Andre Russell batting. The easiest way to get him out is to bowl short pitch deliveries or bouncers at him. Andre Russell struggle against short balls continues in BBL 06. Bowlers in Big Bash League picked up this weakness last year but Russell hasn't worked on his batting technique and his nightmares against bouncers are becoming a reality. Bowlers knows Andre's weakness and they will keep attacking him by dropping short balls.

Jamaican cricket allrounder, Andre Russell claimed last year that he has got no weakness and he is not afraid of any bowlers. He hits the ball when it is in his zone or will take singles if he can't smash it for boundary. His philosophy of playing cricket is just to keep it simple. But it seems like those days are over, Russell weakness against bouncers are clearly identified and now he is afraid of fast bowlers with deadly bouncers. Ricky Ponting as Channel 10 commentator said, "You have to be able to reinvent yourself as a player". He told 10 Sports, "Every team picked this (short-ball weakness) up on Andre Russell last year, and he hasn't changed. Nothing's changed. And they're going to attack him even more in that region this season. "We've already seen in game three he could have been out three times to a similar delivery." - sourced from cricket.com.au Should Andre be practicing more pull shots or stick to his philosophy of keeping game simple?

Ricky Ponting analysis of Andre Russell Technique:

Punter said that he has watched Russell playing pull shot which is not an ideal technique. Ponting said, "He's obviously a power player, he looks to get his weight forward on that big front leg of his and just swing as hard as he can across to the leg side. "But his weight is actually going forward, and he's trying to hit a pull shot. That's not the ideal set-up for the perfect pull shot. "The other thing he can do is just not play it, just not play that pull shot for the first couple of overs that he's out there. "Teams will attack him that way but he will only get out if he looks to play a big flat-batted shot either to the leg-side or, like game one, try and hit a big cut shot down to third man. 

Andre Russell is clearly missing confidence and look rusty in this season of KFC Big Bash League. He has only scored 19 runs in 3 games and took 3 wickets. Defending champions Sydney Thunder sits at the bottom of Big Bash points table. His weakness against short balls and poor technique to play pull shots are adding to his disastrous Big Bash league campaign in 2016-17. 

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