K L RAHUL - ALL TALENT AND NO CONSISTENCY
There are very few cricketers in the world that can impress you and frustrate you at the same time. Kl Rahul is one of those players. When he burst onto the international stage in 2014, with a 100 against Australia in Australia, the expectations were sky high. 11 years later, he is a talented player, who has still not lived up to his potential and this infuriates many cricket fans around the world.
He is player who is almost the complete package. He has the defensive technique of Dravid, the attacking capability of Sehwag, the shot selection of Tendulkar and the elegance of Kohli. But these players had once quality, that made them the greats of the game, which is consistency, and this is something Kl Rahul has been lacking his entire career. Every time he plays a good knock, he follows it up with 5 bad ones.
When he started, everyone was sure that he would be a fully established player in all 3 formats. But instead, he is now out of the T20 setup, he is the second-choice keeper to Rishabh Pant in ODI’s and has been in and out of the test teams for the last 6 years.
There are several reasons for this. One big reason is his negative approach to the game. and this is the main reason he has been axed from the T20I squad. For some reason, he plays with the fear of getting out, instead of playing his natural game, which is to attack.
Another reason is his inability to step up in pressure situations. There are several examples of this such as the semi-final vs New Zealand in the 2019 world cup, the semi-final vs England in the 2022 T20 world cup and most recently the final of the 2023 world cup which infuriated many around the world. He came to the crease in the 12th over of the match, batted 107 balls, which is nearly 18 overs and scored 66 which included only 1 boundary. This is also the case of him being overly negative and going into his shell. Many believe that his innings cost India at least another 30-40 runs.
But it must be said that it is not always his fault either. Ever since he debuted, he has played in every position from opener to batting in the middle order, because of which he has never been able to cement his place in any position, like Rohit Sharma has as an opener or Virat Kohli has as a two-down player. The recent test series against Australia summed up this problem perfectly. He started as an opener, went down to number 3 in the batting order for the next test to accommodate Rohit Sharma, and went back to open again in the last test. This has been symbolic of his career. He keeps getting shifted up and down the order and because of this, his consistency has also been affected.
The fact that a player of his quality averages below 35 in test after playing more than 50 test matches is something that flabbergasts many around the world. Every time he comes to the crease, he plays like a player without any confidence and something that is genuinely concerning is that instead of becoming an important player for the Indian team, there is a worry that he could become the next Vinod Kambli.
While there is that fear, there is still time for him to get better as he is still only 32 and still has the backing of the Indian selectors. Hopefully, he gets some more confidence and finally becomes the player we all thought he would become when he first burst onto the scene.