What VVS Laxman said about KL Rahul for South Africa series?
KL Rahul has emerged as one of India’s most effective limited-overs batsmen in recent memory. He has scored runs at an extraordinary pace and has played a crucial part in India’s dominance in white-ball cricket over the last few years. However, the same cannot be said of his success in the game’s longest version.
The Test series against England was a watershed moment in Rahul’s professional life, where he wasn’t his best with the cricket bat. Rahul Dravid’s performance in England has been praised by former Indian batter VVS Laxman, who encourages him to go on against South Africa. Aside from that, Laxman said that Rahul’s comeback storey in Test cricket is one to be applauded.
According to Laxman, who was speaking at a pre-series review on Star Sports, “What an incredible return he has made into this Indian Test squad. He was presented with a chance since Mayank Agarwal and Shubman Gill were injured, and he took advantage of the situation.”
Rahul will have to follow the same approach that Laxman employed in England, which allowed him to get a lot of runs there, according to Laxman as well.
“We know that he is an aggressive player that he is a stroke player, but he also understands that if you want to thrive in South Africa, you have to know where your off-stump is. In the series against England, we noticed that he was missing a lot of deliveries,” Laxman said of his stroke-playing ability.
Along with Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul took advantage of English bowlers
Rahul scored 315 runs at an average of 39.37 during India’s tour of England, ranking him as the second-highest run-scorer for the national team in that tour. He finished only a few runs behind Rohit Sharma’s 368 runs. Because Rohit has been ruled out of the next series against South Africa, Rahul will be carrying a significant amount of responsibility.
Rahul was utterly out of touch in the team’s most recent journey to South Africa. During the series, he only managed to score 30 runs in four innings. In the three-match series against the Proteas, which will begin on the 26th of December, he will have plenty of opportunities to improve his record against them.
One of the four Test-playing countries against whom Rahul has not made a century is South Africa. He will be trying to score a century against them to solidify his place in the Indian team for the World Cup.
The performance in the first Test match would justify VVS Laxman’s comments on the Indian opening batsman
KL Rahul won the Man Of The Match award in the first Test match. He scored a brilliant 123 to give his team the advantage in this series and will now want to build on this performance in the opening game of the series. Team India will be focused and keen to win their first-ever series in South Africa and will want to push for a solid performance in the second game of the three-match series.
Things are not going well for the hosts, with Quinton de Kock announcing his retirement from Test cricket in the middle of this series. To add to that, the team’s form with the bat will be a matter of concern, as they failed to put sufficient runs on the board in both innings.
This will make things interesting, with India wanting to win this series and the home side trying to prevent that from happening. The second game of the series has gained a lot more importance now, as it could actually be the series decider between these two sides.
Virat Kohli and co. would be ready for a right, though there is still some doubts within the camp of the hosts. Though they will be keen to bounce back in this match, there could be a bit of uncertainty with the form that they are showcasing at present. Not all of their players are on the same page and this could hurt them in the long run.
Hopefully, skipper Dean Elgar and the team management can sort things out. They will want to put in a much better performance in the upcoming game and try to ensure that they are still in the series. With two games to go, things are getting really interesting now.
