Follow UsKL Rahul has featured in 59 Tests and has played a lot of match-saving and match-winning knocks, but still averages less than 35. The right-handed batter from Karnataka has played enough red-ball cricket to understand no matter how well he prepares, there’s no guaranteed success in Test cricket.
In the first Test against England at Headingley, Rahul scored an eye-pleasing 42 off 78 in the first innings and followed it up with a stunning 247-ball 137 in the second essay. Rahul put on 195 runs for the fourth wicket alongside Rishabh Pant (118) and helped India set England a target of 371 in the final innings.
"The sooner you learn that there is no connection (of your game, preparation etc) with the outcome and the results that you get, the calmer you can be. And I feel like that's the only thing that gives you the best chance to play at this level for a long period of time. And that's something that I've consciously done as well,” said Rahul, as reported by ESPNcricinfo.
"Having learned this from the seniors that I looked up to, it's something that I've understood and try and do, not just in Test cricket, but in cricket overall. Just all you can do is your best in terms of preparation and giving yourself the best chance to succeed. But again, there's no guarantees. When you have a good day, you are happy. When you have a bad day, you're still happy that you had the opportunity. That's how I look at the game."
Rahul often starts the series with a couple of solid knocks but fails to keep his form going throughout the series. Even in Australia, Rahul played three good knocks in the first three games but ended the series with scores of 0, 24, 13 and 4. It’s one of the key reasons why he has never had a 400-plus series in red-ball cricket for India.
"I was happy with the way I was batting in Australia, but very disappointed at the end of the series that I couldn't convert. I think I had opportunities in every game, I got starts in every game, and in an ideal world, I would've wanted to convert all of those innings into big knocks.
"But unfortunately, I couldn't do that. And that's how the game goes sometimes. Sometimes you get a good ball, sometimes you play a bad shot. It's part of the game, so you learn from the mistakes, and that's something that I learned from that series, just to make sure that once I get a start, try and make it count and transfer as many runs as I can."
Talking about not having a fixed batting position before this series, the 33-year-old said: "The last couple of years I've forgotten what my position is and what I'm comfortable doing. I'm happy to be given different responsibilities and different roles. Makes the game exciting and makes me want to challenge myself and train that much harder and work on my game a little bit more. So I've quite enjoyed doing that.
"And the last couple of series, my role has been to open the batting, and I've enjoyed doing that as well. Yeah, I mean that's something that I did growing up and all my early years as a cricketer was me opening the batting. So yeah, I'm happy that I'm back doing that, and I'm happy that I'm doing the job for the team."