Rahul — the quintessential team player who puts guts over glory

K.L. Rahul threw his head back, in quasi-disappointment. He had fairly smashed the ball, but he didn’t get either the distance or the elevation he was looking for. As the ball went to deep mid-wicket on the bounce, he grimaced and ran a single. How he would have loved to have made sweeter contact for the ball to sail over the fence!

In the two previous successful chases that he had seen through to their logical end, Rahul had, to borrow a famous line from Ravi Shastri, ‘finished things off in style.’ Against Bangladesh in India’s Champions Trophy opener, he drop-kicked Tanzim Hasan over long-leg. Against Australia in the semifinal, he charged and clattered Glenn Maxwell over long-on. Both sixes, both completing victories he had played a huge role in shaping. A hat-trick of winning sixes, the last of them to win the title, would have been in the fitness of things.

It wasn’t to be, but hey, who cares, right? Rahul was there when the tape was breasted, when the New Zealand tally was overhauled, when the Champions Trophy was clinched. So what if Ravindra Jadeja, another of the unsung heroes, smacked the winning four? So what, really?

If there was a contest for yo-yoing within the Indian ranks, Rahul would triumph by a country mile. He may not want to, but he will, because he has yo-yoed so much within the playing XI that it has become second nature.

Man for all seasons

Want a middle-order wicketkeeper-batter in 50-over cricket? K.L. Rahul. Need someone to reprise a similar role in two away Tests in South Africa, in Rishabh Pant’s absence? KL Rahul. Need a Test No. 4 because Virat Kohli is away on paternity leave? K.L. Rahul. A Test opener because Rohit Sharma is missing? K.L. Rahul. Someone to drop down to No. 6 in ODIs because Axar Patel’s left-handedness is deemed more important? K.L. Rahul. At a stretch, the only thing Rahul hasn’t done in international cricket is keep wicket to his own bowling. Impossible as that is, don’t put it past Rahul being asked to do so. And actually ending up doing it.

Now in his 12th year in international cricket, Rahul has been there and done that. He became the quickest Indian to score a century in all three formats internationally, within 18 months of his maiden appearance for India in the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne in December 2014. He has led India in all three formats in a stand-in capacity, he has fulfilled every responsibility thrust on his shoulders, he has shouldered every burden conceivable. He is a veteran of 58 Tests, 85 ODIs and 72 T20Is. And while he might not — or he might, who knows? — entertain that notion, you can’t help feel that few are deemed more dispensable than the 32-year-old from Bengaluru.

Rahul in full flight is just the most gorgeous sight on the cricket field. He has so much time on his hands, the one quality that separates the greats from even the very, very goods, but he hasn’t so much as flirted with greatness. Maybe not even thought about it. Look at him easing into a Test innings, tight in defence and attractive and unfussed in stroke-play and you will be aghast when you pore over his numbers. An average of 33.57? Just eight hundreds in 58 games? Really, Rahul?

Really, yes. Perhaps because he hasn’t had a settled position, perhaps he has been yo-yoed — that term again — around, yanked from one slot and thrust into the next, then uprooted from there and sent elsewhere. He has had backing, of that there is little doubt. But what use backing when there is a lack of consistency in the methodology. One of the great coaching philosophies revolves not just on opportunity, but the quality of the opportunity. That’s something that has passed Rahul by.

But to his great credit, like his illustrious namesake from the same city, Rahul has never complained. Never moaned or cribbed. Never carped about being moved out of his comfort zone — does he even know what it is anymore? — or being asked to do this, that and the other. He has taken on every task manfully, without a raised eyebrow, without a frown, let alone a scowl. Maybe he has allowed himself to be taken for granted. That can happen, you know, when you have forgotten how to complain, how to play the system.

The perception about Rahul is far removed from reality. When he started the three-match ODI series at home against England last month, India’s last tango before the Champions Trophy, as the preferred wicketkeeper-batter, everyone who had an opinion – which, in India, is everyone who knows the spelling of cricket and several others who don’t know even that – was wondering why. Why Rahul? Why not Pant, the man with the X-Factor? The force of nature, irrepressible and untamed? What was Rahul doing in the XI with Pant on the sidelines?

Rahul poses with the ICC Champions Trophy.
| Photo Credit:
AP

The answer would’ve stared us in the face if we had gone looking, made even a token attempt to do so. At No. 5 in ODIs, Rahul averaged in the mid-50s, scored in the mid-90s for 100 balls faced. Pant’s ODI numbers in 31 matches are 33.50 average, admittedly a superior strike-rate of 106.21. For all his pyrotechnics in Test cricket, Pant hasn’t quite got a grip of white-ball ball-flaying.

But this isn’t a ‘who-is-stronger’ debate. Or even discussion. For now, for the foreseeable future, Rahul should be the preferred ODI stumper batting at No. 5 or No. 6, which seems to be the position the current management group has zeroed in on for him. If Pant needs to be accommodated, it must be at the expense of someone else though who that someone else is will trigger a fresh headache.

Rahul’s ‘demotion’ – if that’s the right word – to No. 6 stemmed from the desire to have a left-hander, in this case Axar Patel, at No. 5. India chose to fix something that wasn’t broken though they had done it with good reason, after a lot of thought and with sound logic. Rahul was included in the discussion because he needed to be. He had to grow comfortable with the idea of facing fewer balls in an innings, which would then mean he would have to change his mindset, his preparation, his approach to practice.

Always willing and able, Rahul took on the new challenge head-on. He didn’t do the same thing expecting different results but practiced with smarts, replicating game situations to the extent that they can be in practice. He realised that there would be times when he would walk out with only five or six overs left, which then meant he could take little time to bed himself in. Therefore at nets, he started to whack balls out of the park from the get-go. Not just any balls, but ageing, softer orbs of the kind he would encounter at that stage of the innings. He finessed range-hitting into a fine art, raining down thunderous blows at the ICC Academy ground where India practiced ad nauseum between matches and periods of rest and recovery.

Rohit alluded to Rahul’s calm head and the effect his presence has on the dugout. Rahul has been many things in the past – nervy and withdrawn and shell-locked at the top of the order in even T20s primary among them – but there is a certain composure to him now that’s impossible to miss. He seems at peace, more than even before. His words are still measured but not steeped in caution or wariness. He is more trusting, a little more outgoing, a little less economical with his smiles. He is 32 and approaching that age where, if he isn’t already there, batters hit their peak.

He already has 11 years of top-flight cricket under his belt and potentially another half-dozen ahead of him if he can keep the fire burning. Very soon, he will become the senior most Test batter and therefore will be expected to lead the way in so many different ways. He has convinced himself, as he should, that being asked to don different roles is a compliment to his versatility and his flexibility. It’s a show of confidence in his skills, of course, but also in the ease with which he can adapt to new and unfamiliar situations. Instead of allowing his various ever-changing avatars to undermine his confidence, he has used it as the stepping stone to greater things.

At the Champions Trophy, Rahul was exceptional. During each of the three chases of which he was a part, there was plenty of work ahead of him when he strode out at four wickets down. Eighty-five needed against Bangladesh in 119 balls — plenty of time but India had just lost three for 32. Eighty-seven required against Australia in 90, in a knockout semifinal. And sixty-nine to get in 68 in the final, with the ball starting to play tricks.

Rahul played one get-out-of-jail short early in each of those chases, then knocked the ball around, pushed the singles, elicited the errors. He kept his wits about him, didn’t overreach. In those three chases, he ended with 41 (47b), 42 (34b) and 34 (33b) respectively. He had kept more than competently and was Rohit’s final go-to man when it came to DRS challenges, but it was as the great finisher at No. 6 that he was worth his weight in gold. Having batted at nets like he would in a match, he effortlessly made the switch under immense pressure, with so much on the line.

There was no glory medal or award — heck, not even a glory shot to win the title — but Rahul will tell you that he will take guts and victories ahead of glory. Every single day.