Why Was Karun Nair Preferred Over Shreyas Iyer & Sarfaraz Khan For England Tests - Agarkar Explains

Karun Nair played last of his six Tests against Australia in Dharamsala back in 2017. While he did score a triple century (303) against England in Chennai, the right-hander failed to impress the selectors thereafter, with just 71 runs in the remainder of his Test career. 

However, since then, Nair has scored plenty of runs in the domestic circuit over the last couple of years and also has county experience, which is one of the main reasons he has been picked in the side ahead of Shreyas Iyer and Sarfaraz Khan.

While Iyer and Sarfaraz have scored heavily in the Ranji Trophy, their lack of county experience could have gone against them. Moreover, chief selector Ajit Agarkar believes Nair's experience would help fill the void left by Virat Kohli.

“It's fair on somebody, it's unfair on someone else. At the moment, he [Karun Nair] has scored heaps of runs. He has played a bit of county cricket," Agarkar said while announcing the squad for the Test series against England.

“Sometimes you just have to make good decisions. Sarfaraz, I know he got a hundred in the first Test [against New Zealand] and then didn't get runs. Sometimes these are decisions the team management takes. At the moment, Karun has scored heaps of runs in domestic, has played a bit of Test cricket, played a bit of county cricket. With Virat [Kohli] not there, clearly we're lacking a bit of experience. We felt his experience could help,” he added.

As a result, Nair could very well be a stop-gap option to replace Kohli at four. India get their Test series against England underway with the first game on June 20 at Headingley.