TIL Desk Sports/ Ajinkya Rahane’s slump in form can’t be ‘judged’ by anyone, not even skipper Virat Kohli, who feels that his Test deputy needs an arm of assurance around his shoulders as he figures out what exactly is he going through.
The Indian captain, after the team’s thumping 1-0 series win over New Zealand, answered some tricky questions, including his own form or the lack of it which, he said, couldn’t be connected to any repetitive pattern of dismissals. He also said that some discussions about team combination will happen ahead of India’s tour of South Africa later this month.
“I can’t judge his (Rahane’s) form. No one can judge it. Only the individual knows what he’s going through,” Kohli said when asked about the Mumbaikar’s poor patch which has resulted in an average of less than 20 across 12 Tests. For Kohli, it is important that Rahane, for all his good past record, feels secure and the team wouldn’t like to press the panic button just yet.
“We need to back them in these moments, especially when they have done well in the past. We don’t have this environment where we have our players asking ‘what happens now? That’s not how we do it in the side.
