India captain Virat Kohli has said that the team management will not be influenced by outside voices while taking a call on the future of Ajinkya Rahane in the team. The Test vice-captain has been in terrible form with just one century to his name since 2020.
Rahane had captained the Indian team in the first Test against New Zealand in Kanpur, which ended in a draw. In that Test, Rahane scored 35 and 4 runs and his mode of dismissals has been a hot topic of debate.
The right-hander missed the second Test in Mumbai due to an injury and with the Indian squad for the upcoming three-Test matches against South Africa to be named shortly, all focus has been on Rahane’s fate given his extended poor run with the bat.
With the brilliant Test debut of Shreyas Iyer and the fact that the team management wants to play Shubman Gill in the middle order once Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul return to open the innings, the pressure was on Rahane to come good in these two Test matches and with him failing to get a big score, has put his future in jeopardy.
However, Kohli backed Rahane and made it clear that no one can judge Rahane's form and the Team needs to back players if they are going through a tough phase.
"I cannot judge Ajinkya’s form. I think no one can judge it. The individual knows the areas of the game he needs to work hard. We need to back players who have come up with impact performances for us in the past under tough situations in key Test matches," said Kohli in the press conference after India's win over New Zealand.
"If there is some pressure on an individual and people start creating an environment wherein everyone is asking "what will happen next?", we don't entertain that as a Team. We cannot expect that balance outside. The same people who praise certain players want them out of the team after two months," he added.
There has been sort of a unanimous opinion from cricket experts that Rahane should be given a break in order to get himself together and since the younger batters have done so good, there cannot be justice done to their talent if out of form batters are continuously given a long rope.
Kohli, on the other hand, said the team and management have never made a call on any player's exclusion based on the talks going on outside.
"We have never reacted like that and we never will because we know the amount of hard work and effort that goes into it. We will support him, whether it is Ajinkya or someone else. We won't make a decision based on the atmosphere outside," said Kohli.
India will now face South Africa in a series of 3 Tests and 3 ODIs in a rejigged schedule as they fly to the rainbow nation after a few days.
(ANI inputs)
