After scoring a sumptuous ton on his return to international cricket after six long months, KL Rahul, while talking with Star Sports, revealed that he was sure of not playing the IND vs PAK match and was ready to serve water to teammates.
However, a sudden injury to Shreyas Iyer (back spasm) led to Rahul being slotted into the side just five minutes before the toss.
Rahul never looked back from there and scored his 6th ODI century, stitched a 243-run stand with Virat Kohli, and ultimately led India to a memorable 228-run victory.
“Just 5 minutes before the toss, Rahul bhai (Rahul Dravid) told me you might have to play because Shreyas (Iyer) got a back spasm last minute. I didn’t bring anything with me because I thought I’d be serving water. Strange things have happened to me in my career.” Rahul said this when talking about how he got to play due to a sudden change of plans.
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When asked how he felt when he went out to bat and what his mindset was, Rahul said, “So when I walked in, I had that initial nervousness. It took me 10-15 balls to just calm myself down and get my feet moving, get my mind thinking of the right things. Then, when I hit one or two boundaries, all those things, the fogginess in your clarity, went away, and it became like before. I was looking at the ball, looking at the situation, and you see what you have to do.”
He also elaborated that the rain made things a little bit difficult for him to get back into the rhythm due to constant disruptions, and therefore it took him some time to get set.
But just when I got my rhythm, it started raining. Unfortunately, it started raining, and I had to wait for a whole day. Today we came back and had to wait for the innings to start. So I had to restart the innings again. So, again, the first 10-15 balls were sort of nervy, and after that, once you start playing, once you start to hit a few balls in the middle, you forget about those things, and then you start thinking about where you can score runs and what I have to do. So, yeah, that’s how I felt, and that doesn’t happen too often when you play for a continuous period of time.” Rahul added.
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When asked about his record-breaking unbeaten partnership with Virat Kohli, KL Rahul said “He has hit 13,000 runs. I can’t say anything about that man; he is just phenomenal. Words are short to describe what a great cricketer he is, and I’ve always felt comfortable playing with him in the middle. We run really hard. It’s not that he runs hard only for himself; he runs his partner’s runs as well really hard, and there’s good communication between us. We both really like being in those situations; we’ve been there before.
Initially, he gave me some time; I had said that I need some time to get those quick singles because I need to feel comfortable and confident in my body, and he understood that. After that, it was just a flow. He was doing what he does best, and that gave me some time to get into the game, and I started playing my shots. So we were just reminding ourselves that we have to play proper cricket shots and play to our strengths.”
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