Karun Nair's comeback to the Indian team after a long wait of eight years made for a heartwarming storyline coming into the India vs England Test series. The only Indian apart from Virender Sehwag to have a Test triple century to his name, Nair had a spectacular domestic season with Vidarbha leading to his call-up to the national side. However, the comeback series has not quite gone well for Nair.
The right-hander, who has batted one-down so far in the series, has scored only 131 runs at an average of less than 22 in three matches. The numbers look even more ordinary when you factor in the flat pitches in the first two games of the series.
Following the loss at Lord's, India now trail the five-match series 1-2 and winning the fourth Test in Manchester is the only way to keep the hopes of claiming the first series in England since 2007 alive. With the team under pressure, their have been calls on the Internet to look beyond Nair. However, the Indian management is backing Nair.
Will Karun Nair play 4th Test?
"That might be counter-intuitive when you're 2-1 down in the series. But we feel like the guys have been excellent for large parts of the series," said assistant coach Ryan Ten Doeschate in a press conference ahead of the fourth Test.
"The repetition of losing lots of wickets in a very short space of time has obviously been the key feature of the two losses. Probably both times in Headingley and obviously overnight and first thing in the morning at Lord's, we feel cost us the game was losing six wickets for 40 again. But if you look at it individually, if you look at the run tally of all the batters they're all batting nicely," he said.
"Even someone like Karun, we feel his rhythm is good, his tempo is good. We want more runs from the three. But the message is mainly, let's really focus on what we've done well and tidy up the little things that have cost us results, essentially," Ten Doeschate added.
Another poor outing in the fourth Test could force the team management to bring in Sai Sudharsan who had made his Test debut in the opening game of the series. The left-hander was then dropped from the second match onwards as the management wanted to fit in more all-rounders.
