There have been quite a few murmurs of Karun Nair having possibly exhausted his last chance to have a decent run in the Indian Test team after he was dropped from the side for the fourth Test against England at Old Trafford. Nair’s stellar performance in domestic cricket last year prompted his return to the Indian Test team after eight years.
However, in the three Tests he has played this series, Nair managed scores of 0, 20 playing at No.6 in the first Test. He was then moved up to his preferred No.3 spot after Sudharsan was dropped but then only put up scores of 31, 26, 40 and 14. Former India batter Sanjay Manjrekar has now said that it is unfortunate that Nair couldn’t grab the second chance he got in international cricket.
“It was an emotional story where he said, ‘Cricket, give me another chance’. Cricket gave him another chance,” said Manjrekar on JioStar, referring to Nair’s viral “give me one more chance” tweet in December 2022. “Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to catch it. And, you know, we have Sai Sudarshan coming back. So that was the story. Good to see Sai Sudarshan back, because I thought he should have played the second test as well.”
It had earlier looked like India would retain Karun for the Old Trafford Test, with Gill defending his the 33-year-old’s poor returns in the pre-match press conference. “We think Karun is batting well,” he said. “The first match he didn’t really play at his number (batted at 6). It’s difficult when a player is making a comeback in a series like this, you know. But I don’t think there’s been any issue with his batting. Sometimes it’s also about getting that click, you know. Once you’re able to make your 50, then you’re able to get back into your zone and get some big runs. Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened for him so far.”
Nair’s performance in this series is a bit of a surprise considering he showed good form in the matches he played in England leading up to it. After a double century in Canterbury in a tour match, followed by a 40 in Northampton in the second pratice game, Karun got his chance to return to Test cricket after a long gap.
In domestic cricket, Nair will return to Karnataka after a hiatus of three years for the upcoming domestic season after Vidarbha Cricket Association granted him the No Objection Certificate (NOC), reported PTI. Karun played a major role in Vidarbha’s title-winning run in the 2024-25 season, scoring 863 runs at an average of 53 and he also made a hundred in the final against Kerala. He had a six-month streak where he scored 1,897 runs and nine centuries across formats for Vidarbha, concluding with a Ranji Trophy title.
