Kings XI Punjab haven’t been winning too many matches in this IPL, they have lost four out of their five games so far, but two of their batsmen — KL Rahul and Mayank Agarwal — have been among the best scorers of the tournament.

While Rahul leads the tally with 302 runs, Mayank is not too far away with an aggregate of 272. But unlike Rahul, who is known to be a fine white-ball batsman, Mayank’s exploits in international cricket has mainly been in the Test arena.

Jonty Rhodes, who is part of the Kings XI’s coaching set up, believes Mayank plays “smart cricket” and hence he is comfortable in switching formats.

“Mayank has made inroads into the India Test side and he is one of the senior guys now. He is energetic and quite a character. He’s fit and strong. I think he has proved that he is not just a Test batsman. If you’re opening the batting, you do get value for your shots. But the key is maintaining the tempo even after the Powerplay, which Mayank does so very well,” Rhodes told The Telegraph from Dubai.

“I think Mayank has certainly shown that he can be that top-order batsman in T20s as well to bat till 16 overs at least. His fitness levels are massive. For guys other than power-hitters like Chris Gayle and Kieron Pollard, they need to be able to rotate the strike and still keep busy and strong once the Powerplay is over. And Mayank has done that.

“He has just shown that the way he plays his cricket, he is good enough for any format. Smart cricket sums up Mayank and you can’t brand him as a Test or T20 player,” the former South Africa middle-order batsman and a legendary fielder observed.

Elaborating on Rahul and Mayank’s opening combination, Rhodes said: “What Mayank and KL have shown together is that you can really play good cricket shots and still get runs. You don’t have to just hit everything out of the park.

“Also, the way they run the ones has been incredible.”

Rhodes is also mighty impressed with how the fielding standards of Indian cricketers have improved in the last few years.

“For the first five or six IPLs, the best fielders by far were only the overseas international players. But if you are now talking about brilliant fielding efforts, 90 per cent of the time it’s by young Indian players, as well some of the established ones, like (Ravindra) Jadeja. A lot of that has got to do with Virat Kohli’s insistence on a strong, fit and healthy Indian team. That has been the driving force,” Rhodes, who is also the head coach of the Sweden cricket team, said.