Ajinkya Rahane, the man who is hanging by a small thread of hope to continue in the Indian team, has come up with some startling accusations against his team members and support staff. He has also claimed that he has performed enough and that he has got lot of cricket left in him. At the sametime, he is not ready to accept his faults and is rather intent on promoting himself. This is about Rahane and his rants.
Some of Rahane’s comments
Rahane believes that he is being unfairly targetted. It is an extraordinary claim considering his abject failure with the bat for more than 6 years. Rahane is certain that people who know the sport won’t talk like that and would rather talk sensibly. He also says that there is no need for him to justify his contribution to the team. At this point, we can only chuckle because we know what has been his contribution and what he is talking about. He further adds that he did not get the deserved recognition for the decisions that he says he took on that tour of Australia. When asked about his batting, Rahane says “Yes, I m confident about my own ability, I m batting really well and I still believe that I have good cricket left in me”.
This is where we need to ask him questions
The struggle that Rahane has gone through over the last 6 years is extraordinary. Everytime, when he is about to be dropped from the team, he comes up with a performance that is just enough to keep him in the team. On the basis of that solitary innings, he continues to be in the playing eleven and never really contributes until his place is threatened again. Fortunately for him and unfortunately for India, some of his innings did end up in India winning and that gave him the tag of a performer under pressure. The many innings where he failed and because of that India lost was either conveniently forgotten or is overlooked. This has practically kept him in the team all these while.
Bowlers were more in focus
The one reason his lack of contribution did not merit that much focus was because India were winning. At home, the Indian team is virtually invisible whereas for the first time in the history of Indian cricket, they were winning outside of home. This included multiple series wins in the West Indies and Sri Lanka though those teams are nowhere near international standards but for an Indian fan, who had lived through the embarrassment that extended till the early years of the new millennium, especially in the West Indies, this was unbelievable. It is still unbelievable that India have won 4 consecutive series in West Indies. Mind you, there are still teams like England and Pakistan who struggle in West Indies. This on top of absolute authority at home.
Wins outside the sub-continent helped
Moreover, since the turn of the millennium, the Indian team started to win in the SENA countries. The most sought after wins for any team from the sub-continent. Though the wins dried during the Dhoni era, under Kohli, India again started to win atleast one test every series and they were competitive for the most part. All of these contributed to shift the focus away from the batsmen and primarily the struggling ones. Instead the focus fell on the bowlers who were largely responsible for keeping the team in the game. Kohli and to a certain extent Pujara and Pant and lately, Rohit scored the bulk of the runs that helped to team to be competitive.
The struggle of the middle order
Thus, Rahane did not feel that much pressure. However, when Kohli’s runs dried and Pujara stopped scoring and with Kohli adamant in playing just the 5 batsmen, the focus has rightly fell on Rahane and his lack of contribution. Except for that one hundred in Melbourne, he was pretty lucky in that innings too, his lack of contribution came into sharp focus. That is when things started to get tougher for Rahane. People started to see that Rahane wasn’t contributing anything and is playing just on reputation. He string of low scores dotted by one crucial score had masked his struggle throughout his career. People started to realise that.
Now, the fans wants him replaced. Rahane is not happy about it because he feels that people who know the game will not question him. He must understand that it is people who know the game, who will be capable of talking based on statistics. Despite overwhelming evidence against him, it really is a shame that Rahane is not willing to accept his faults. I do not mind in him saying that he still have some cricket left in him but at the sametime, if only he had the courage to admit his failures and then say what he said, I will not blame him.
Rahane’s claim about bringing on Ashwin early
Now, moving onto his next claim that he didn’t claim credit for the decisions he took in Australia. Specifically, he says that it was he who brought Ashwin before the 10th over at Melbourne. He says that it was a spark on his head. However, he has been left embarrassed by Ashwin’s revelation more than a year ago about how it was Ravi Shastri who planned for Ashwin to take the new ball and that Ravi had already informed Rahane about it. It is onething to demand for credit but it is quite another to lie about something he did not do.
Conclusion to Rahane and his rants
Enough is enough, Rahane. Your time is up. You must gracefully retire or must face the disgrace of being dropped. Better players like Sehwag endured that so why can’t Rahane? There are far too many batsmen waiting in the wings. It is time for BCCI to end Rahane’s nightmare and that of the team. With Kohli’s and Pujara’s continued struggle, India cannot afford one more passenger in Rahane. Now, Rahane is cosying upto Rohit. It is an utter disgrace. Hopefully, the Mumbai chum will not work.