He Didn’t Go Anywhere: Ravichandran Ashwin Heaps Massive Praise For KL Rahul Ahead Of Third ODI
New Delhi: Rohit Sharma-led Team India is set to face Steve Smith’s Australia in the third and final ODI of the series. The ODI series is currently leveled 1-1 and the series decider would be played at the Chepauk Stadium in Chennai. Ahead of the third ODI, India’s spin maestro Ravi Ashwin praised India’s hero in the first ODI, KL Rahul.
KL Rahul was dropped after the second Border Gavaskar Trophy Test following poor outings with the bat. He once again returned to the playing 11 in the ODI series and played a match-winning knock. Fans following his knock stormed social media saying ‘KL Rahul is back’.
Ashwin answered to all these claims on his social media and said KL Rahul never left. He said “Immediately after his [KL Rahul’s] knock, people are like, “KL Rahul is back!” KL Rahul didn’t go anywhere when it comes to ODI cricket to be back. He didn’t go anywhere for us to put him down one day and then suddenly celebrate him the other day. We shouldn’t do that.”
“In the sporting world, we should know how to assess a player’s performance correctly. If we don’t do that, we will back all the wrong people and will play all the wrong people. If the people we like do something good and get trending on Twitter, we will start celebrating them and worshipping them like anything,” Ashwin added.
“But if they are going through a bad patch, we will not appreciate or celebrate their value or the magnitude of what they are doing,” Ashwin said.
Ashwin then went on to compare Rahul’s performance in ODI with MS Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh. He said “KL Rahul is doing a very difficult role for India with ease. He has been a proper box office in ODIs. He has got phenomenal numbers batting at number five. Go and search if you can find anyone even close to him in terms of his numbers in ODI cricket.”
“Sometimes, it is very funny, right? Consider everyone currently batting at No.5 in ODI cricket currently,” Ashwin elaborated.
“There isn’t even one cricketer at the moment who bats at No.5 in ODIs and has made a mark for himself because it is a very tough position to bat. Yuvraj Singh and MS Dhoni were the only two guys who batted mostly at No.5 in ODIs and made a mark for themselves. For Australia, it was Michael Bevan,” he added.