Australia tour 2020 will decide whether KL Rahul belongs to the league of greats

It’s another few days before the first ball of the Australia-India Test series is bowled. This high-stakes series will mark the return of India to Test cricket after a long time and the fans will be curious to know how their favorite stars fare in what is called the toughest series in the circuit.

The Australia Test series offer a massive opportunity to one Indian player and he is KL Rahul. At 28, Rahul is on the ascending curve of his career and if he can return strong from this tour, he will go a long way in cementing his name as one of India’s best batsmen ever to play the game. There is no dearth of talent. One only has to see if Rahul can make full use of it.

KL Rahul is a different player now — in-form & confident

The world has changed a lot since Rahul last toured Australia. In that historic series of 2018-19, Rahul’s place in the side was a subject of debate, thanks to his prolonged bad form. While his performance was ordinary in the T20I series, he failed to score a single 50 in three Tests that he played (out of four) and missed the ODIs because of a TV controversy, along with Hardik Pandya. In five Test innings, he scored only 57 runs with the highest score of 44, even if India went on to win the series 2-1. One could still ask if Rahul got an opportunity at all had Prithvi Shaw not injured himself just ahead of the first Test.

This time, Rahul’s place is not only secured in the team but he will also be expected to shoulder a bigger responsibility. He will not only be one of the frontline batsmen to take on a formidable Australian pace attack but also will be required to keep the wickets in the limited-over formats besides chipping in as Virat Kohli’s deputy. Rahul will be particularly watched in the Test series once Kohli heads home after the first Test.

With Rohit Sharma also not in the equations in Australia this summer, stand-in captain Ajinkya Rahane will be banking on Rahul as his most potent weapon in the batting order in Tests. Overall, this series will throw at Rahul one of the biggest challenges of his career, and given his current form with the bat and experience with the captaincy in the Indian Premier League, he should be well-equipped to come out with flying colors.

Can Rahul be Tendulkar of 1991-92, Dravid of 2003-04, Kohli of 2014-15?

A tour of Australia is considered the ultimate acid test in Tests for any great batsman in the world. Players like Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, and VVS Laxman have all proved it in the past. While the Master Blaster made his first claim to greatness in the 1991-92 tour of Down Under, Dravid more than made up for his failure in the 1999 series four years later.

Laxman, who exhibited glimpses of his greatness in the 1999 tour, wielded his magic wand in the 2003-04 series in all formats. Kohli, similarly, came back with confidence from the 2011-12 tour as the only Indian batsman with a ton and made rich exploits in the 2014-15 tour when he also captained his country in a couple of matches.

KL Rahul has a lot to cover in the Test arena yet

Rahul, who has played only five Tests in Australia so far, has one hundred which he made in his first tour in 2014-15. He, in fact, made his Test debut in Australia in that series and scored 110 in only his third innings that he played in Sydney. He made 130 runs in two Tests and after five matches, his total runs on Australian soil reads 187 at an ordinary average of 20.77, the second-lowest after that in South Africa. If the ace batsman wants to see himself elevated to the next level, he has to make this tour of Australia count.

One significant aspect with Rahul today is that his batting has improved in leaps and bounds. He has not only covered a long distance in terms of improvised batting, but he has also adjusted well to batting up and down the order and above all, batting with a courageous approach. The IPL has played a big role in bringing these essential transformations in Rahul as a limited-overs batsman.

However, in Tests, he still has more peaks to conquer than not. He has made five hundreds in 60 innings (34 matches) and the last of them came way back in September 2018. Four of Rahul’s Test tons have come overseas but he averages less than 30 in Tests abroad, nearly 15 points less than his average at home (44.25). Rahul will recall the fact that despite doing well in the limited-overs formats in New Zealand earlier this year, he was ignored for the Test series and he has not played a match in red ball since August 2019.

The Indian team management will also have a task in hand to see that Rahul is used smartly in the upcoming series. While he is also being projected as India’s main keeper in the limited-over formats after MS Dhoni’s exit and Rishav Pant’s fall and he is likely to play that role at least till the 2023 ICC World Cup and the other big tournaments in the T20I formats in between.

It will be the management’s responsibility to see that Rahul doesn’t get fatigued by the dual responsibilities of batting and keeping, especially ahead of the Test series against Australia. He could take a leaf out of the book of the other Rahul from Karnataka in this regard — Dravid.

Rahul’s skill, temperament, and fitness will be tested to the hilt in the upcoming series and it is for him to deliver on the promise that he belongs to the league of the Rahul Dravids and VVS Laxmans.