Abhishek Nayar, India’s assistant coach, has expressed strong confidence in KL Rahul’s capabilities to excel in his Test career, despite an inconsistent decade since his debut at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) in 2014. Rahul’s Test journey has been marked by fluctuations in form, leading to his intermittent presence in the team.
Through his career, Rahul has delivered notable performances, such as his century in his second Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG), followed by impressive centuries in Colombo, Kingston, London, and Centurion (twice). However, these standout innings are interspersed with periods of mediocrity. Indeed, Rahul’s current average of 34.12 stands as the lowest amongst Indian batters who have participated in 50 or more Tests.
Primarily playing as an opener in most of his Test matches, Rahul has recently been repositioned in the middle order. Nayar believes this shift might help Rahul realize his potential and bring more consistency to his performances, benefiting the team significantly.
“When you are playing for India, inspiration is not something you need,” Nayar remarked on Thursday, ahead of the second Test against Bangladesh in Kanpur. “Sometimes it is just direction, and I feel, having spent a little time with KL in the last few days, he is someone who understands his game very well. Yes, there are times when a player is sort of finding his feet.”
Nayar particularly recalls Rahul’s crucial innings in South Africa, where he played some profound knocks for India. “So we are very hopeful with the kind of conversation that Gauti [Gautam Gambhir] bhai and I have had with him, that hopefully we can have a turnaround in KL as well. These things sometimes take time.”
In the first Test in Chennai, Rahul registered scores of 16 and an unbeaten 22 in the two innings. With India pushing for a declaration in the second innings, his promising start was cut short. Nevertheless, Nayar found enough promise in Rahul’s performance to warrant optimism about the future.
“Even in the last game, I know we did not end up giving him much of a shot in the second innings, but the way he was batting in the second innings is the kind of cricket we are expecting and hoping from him. And I am pretty sure going forward you will see the expectations and the performances that you have from him.”
In Chennai, Rahul replaced Sarfaraz Khan at No. 6, despite the latter’s commanding performances against England, where he scored three half-centuries in five innings. Sarfaraz’s national team call-up was a result of his consistent run-scoring efforts in domestic cricket over the last decade.
. While Nayar anticipates Sarfaraz, like any dedicated cricketer, to grasp the situation, he emphasizes the pivotal role of the coaching staff in handling players who find themselves on the sidelines.
“The communication is very clear,” Nayar assured. “The last Test match was 7-8 months ago and there has been a lot of time between that Test match and this one. The communication is very clear, what are your expectations from the players and what do you want them to work on.”
“Every player is motivated, and to be a part of an Indian team is a big thing in a lot of ways. A player understands that there will be times when he will have to sit out for someone else. Such times will come in every player’s career – whether it was Rohit Sharma or Virat Kohli [they had to go through that].”
Despite Sarfaraz practicing for an additional half-hour alongside Dhruv Jurel and Yashasvi Jaiswal on Wednesday, he is unlikely to feature in the upcoming Kanpur Test. Nayar underlined the importance of maintaining a growth mindset among the support staff to foster player development, ensuring that when sidelined players rejoin the team, they are better prepared to deliver impactful performances.
“There will be times when he will have to make way for a senior player. But in those times, it is very important that we as a support staff have a growth mindset and try to develop the players. If the players are even better, when they come back to the team and get a chance, they should be ready to perform.”
As India heads into the Kanpur Test with an expected unchanged batting lineup, speculations arise around the inclusion of an additional spinner in the XI. With weather forecast predicting rain on most days, Nayar, echoing Bangladesh’s head coach Chandika Hathurasingha, opted for cautious optimism regarding the pitch conditions.
“To be honest, I don’t know which surface we are going to play on yet,” Nayar admitted. “But both the pitches look pretty good. Kanpur is often known to have good pitches. I am not sure about the bounce yet. With the conditions and the forecast, it is going to be interesting as to how when we turn up to go in the morning, the conditions are. A lot will depend on that because as you know in Test wicket, conditions can be a huge factor in how the pitch plays.”
“So it is too early for us to judge and decide or have any sort of thought process on the pitch or the conditions. But we are hoping we come in tomorrow to a sunny day and not an overcast Kanpur.”