The Indian wicket-keeper batsman, KL Rahul has shared his feelings of being groomed as the next gloveman of the national team. However, he is well aware of the criticism he would be facing also wary of the criticism which will come his way for filling in MS Dhoni’s boots. He was handed the gloves after Rishabh Pant suffered a concussion an injury during India’s three-match ODI series against Australia earlier this year.
The team management was impressed as Rahul kept performing his duties during the tour of New Zealand. Talking about his prowess with the keeping gloves, Rahul said that doing the job for Karnataka, and the Kings XI Punjab in the IPL has got him going.
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During a chat on Star Sports show, Cricket connected, Rahul said, “People who follow cricket know that I haven’t been away from wicket-keeping for too long as I donned the gloves in the IPL and every time I played for Karnataka. I am always in touch with wicket-keeping. I am also somebody who is more than willing to take up the role if the team needs me to.”
The Karnataka batsman also went on to admit how the crowd always support Dhoni when the former makes a goof-up on the field. Even the young Pant has faced some severe criticism from the audience after he fumbled a few and Rahul hasn’t been any different by any means.
KL Rahul elaborated, “I was nervous when I was doing it for India because of the crowd pressure. If you fumble a ball, people feel that you cannot replace MS Dhoni. The pressure of replacing a legendary wicket-keeper like MSD was immense as it involved people accepting someone else behind the stumps.”
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Recently, KL Rahul auctioned off his 2019 Cricket World Cup bat and raised almost INR 8 lakhs for the ones affected in the massive coronavirus outbreak. On his 28th birthday on April 18, he decided to donate his personal cricketing equipment to the Bharat Army. The latter auctioned them and Rahul’s bat fetched the highest amount of ₹2,64,228.
