"He is a very big part of our plans going ahead in the next few months": Rahul Dravid on Rishabh Pant

India head coach Rahul Dravid on Sunday made it clear that the under-fire Rishabh Pant is a "big" and "integral" part of the set-up heading into the T20 World Cup in Australia.

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Rishabh Pant led the side in the five-match series against South Africa that ended in a 2-2 draw after rain affected the last game. Meanwhile, he managed only 58 runs in the five innings which led to some questions being raised about his place in the shortest format. However, Dravid was very clear that Pant is going nowhere.

"Personally, he would have liked to score a few more runs but it is not concerning him. Certainly, he is a very big part of our plans going ahead in the next few months."

Dravid said during the post-match press conference

He was categorical that he won't judge someone based on one series — whether it is batting form or captaincy.

"I just don't want to be critical. In the middle overs, you need people to play a slightly attacking brand of cricket, to take the game on a little more. Sometimes it's very hard to judge it based on two or three games," the head coach added.

"I think he had a pretty good IPL in terms of strike rate": Rahul Dravid

Rahul Dravid was impressed with Pant's strike rate of 158 plus during the IPL. Pant has also managed an underwhelming 340 run for the Delhi Capitals.

"I think he had a pretty good IPL in terms of strike rate even though it might not have looked good on averages. In IPL, he looked to move up a little bit (in terms of averages), and probably three years ago he was on those numbers. We are hoping that we can get those numbers from him at the international level."

Rahul Dravid on IPL performance of Pant

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"In the process (of playing an attacking game), he might go wrong in a few games but he remains an integral part of our batting line-up with the power he has, and the fact that he is a left-hander is important to us in the middle overs, he played some good knocks," he said.

About his captaincy, Dravid felt that Pant did well considering that he led the side back in the series from 0-2 down.

"To bring a team back from 0-2 down and to level it at 2-2 and give us a chance to win was good. Captaincy is not about wins and losses only. He (Pant) is a young captain, growing as a leader. It is too early to judge him and you don't want to do that after one series," Dravid was clear in his thought process.

"It was nice to see he has got opportunities to lead, keep, and bat. He had a lot of load on him but gaining from that experience and credit to him for ensuring that we went from 0-2 down to 2-2," the coach was all praise for the stand-in skipper.