'Not Acceptable For An Opener' - Dinesh Karthik On KL Rahul's Poor Batting Average

Under the captaincy of Rahul, India won the Test series against Bangladesh by  2-0.

KL Rahul has an average of 34.26 in 45 Tests.

Source : Getty

KL Rahul has been struggling with his willow for quite some time now. Be it a white ball or red ball, he has not been scoring runs on any format of the game. Dinesh Karthik has now questioned KL Rahul’s terrible average in Test cricket. Under the captaincy of Rahul, India won the Test series against Bangladesh by  2-0. But the opener is averaging only 34.26 in 45 Tests which is concerning. 

“I would give KL those couple of Test matches, but if things don’t go Kl Rahul’s way… The one thing that does go against him is the fact that he has played over 40 Tests and his average is just mid-30s. That is not acceptable for an opener. That is one of the lowest among Indian players for sure, who have played 35 Test matches,” Karthik told Cricbuzz.

“That is something that he needs to definitely work on. That will be on his mind. If he wants to cement his place in the Test team, he needs to get a couple of hundreds against Australia. Otherwise, you can definitely see a change, with Shubman Gill doing so well,” he added.

Earlier, It was Ravichandran Ashwin and Shreyas Iyer's heroics that helped India win the match before lunch on the fourth morning.  The 71-run partnership between Iyer and Ashwin is the second-highest for India for the eighth wicket. 

Indian stand-in captain KL Rahul, said, “You trust the guys in the middle (during such situations). We’ve played enough cricket to realise that someone will put their hand up to win us the game. But I’m not going to lie, there was a lot of tension in the dressing room. It was a tough wicket to bat on, they put us under pressure in both innings.”

The Indian team will now be facing Australia in the four-match Test series that will begin from February 3.