KL Rahul has come under the scanner after his failure in India’s first innings of the opening Border-Gavaskar Trophy Test against Australia at VCA Stadium, Nagpur.
Despite his scores of 22, 23, 10 and 2 in an away two-Test series against Bangladesh in December 2022, Rahul was preferred in India’s starting XI over the in-form Shubman Gill.
However, the right-handed opener failed to repay the faith of the team management, scoring only 20 runs off 71 balls with one boundary. As a result, he is drawing flak from the fans and cricket experts, with many of them questioning his place in the side.
On Saturday (February 11), former India pacer Venkatesh Prasad also opined that Rahul is lucky to be considered in the Indian XI ahead of Gill and Sarfaraz Khan, who has been scoring runs consistently in First-Class cricket over the last three seasons.
Taking to Twitter, Prasad wrote: “When there are so many waiting in the wings & in top form. Shubhman Gill is in sublime form,Sarfaraz has been scoring tons in FC cricket and many who deserve a chance ahead of Rahul. Some are just lucky to be given chances endlessly till they succeed while some aren’t allowed to.”
After the close of play on Day 2 in Nagpur, India batting coach Vikram Rathour was asked about KL Rahul’s poor run of form and whether he is lucky to be part of the playing XI.
“I won’t be able to comment on that,” Rathour replied. “But he (Rahul) has scored two hundreds in his last 10 Tests – one in England and other in South Africa and also has a couple of fifties. So we are not yet there.”
For the record, the century in England came in August 2021 and the one against South Africa came in January 2022. Rahul has had run of poor scores with one 50-plus knock in his last nine innings.
