KL Rahul: The middle-order Mr. Dependable

If there is one player that most Indian fans dearly miss at the ICC ODI World Cup 2023, it is Rishabh Pant. The gamechanger who was entering his own league steadily, Pant was the player India relied upon to either steady an innings when things were going well and to counterattack like only he could, when things looked dull.

But January 2023 changed all of that and it meant India were forced to look elsewhere.

Incidentally, it was January in 2020 before the world shut down that an incident involving Pant had a deeper impact on the career of another player. India were playing the first ODI of the year against Australia at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. Pant was a middling, unsettled player whose career suffered another dent when he was hit on the head by a Pat Cummins bouncer. He was concussed and India were now on the lookout for a new wicketkeeper.

Around the same time, another player was looking to fix his spot in the Indian playing XI.

KL Rahul had endured a tough run in Tests, was competing with Shikhar Dhawan to open the batting in white-ball cricket and was finding it tough to bed in either sides. But a knock to the head to Pant opened a spot for him in the XI- in the middle-order.

Indian cricket can sometimes work this way. No planning. No method. No foresight. Like how bikers ride their way through narrow roads and escape, things just happen in this part of the world.

It was just the lifeline Rahul needed in his career. He was away from facing the moving ball. He had time to sit back and look at what the pitch offered. He did not have to worry about facing the best at their freshest. Rahul had a chance to make the middle-order spot his own now.

But right on cue, a few months later, the pandemic hit the world. Rahul had made a hundred in New Zealand batting at five and kept Pant out of the team, but could not keep the run going, for reasons beyond anyone's control.

However, when India's ODI assignments resumed in late 2020, he had done enough to ensure that the number five spot belonged to him and over the course of the next two years, even as his Test form has been up and down, his T20 batting has been bludgeoned, Rahul the ODI batter has stood tall and delivered, whenever he has got his chances.

On Sunday, Rahul showed that he did not need a platform to excel at that position. India were in the pits after Australia had knocked three batters right at the top, leaving them 2-3 in their chase of 200 runs.

Many years ago, in an interview, the prototype finisher of the 21st century Michael Bevan said how he felt comfortable to bat when the side was in a tight spot. How he could plan his innings and begin the recovery and eventually, win the game for Australia from the dead.

Rahul may not be Bevan just yet, far from it some might say. But like the Australian southpaw, he seems to have started to know how to bring out his best in a tight situation as was the case against Australia on Sunday.

While he may have come at five, he was as close to playing the role of an opener as possible, after the early strikes. Yet, there seemed an air of calm around him. There were no poking outside the off stump. No advancing down the pitch. There was stillness and in that space, Rahul did what he does best in ODIs- score runs.

As the innings wore on, he opened up a lot more. His offside play to pace bowling is a striking feature to his batting when his head is in order. On Sunday, it was his late cutting to Adam Zampa that stood out. He let the ball come to him and at the last moment, nearly played the cut off the stumps.

Towards the end, he upped the ante and in the process, timed a shot better than many others in his innings which went for six and left him not out on 97, even as India had started their World Cup with two points on the board.

That number will be etched in the memory of every Indian fan as it was the same two digits on which Gautam Gambhir fell on during the 2011 World Cup final. In most interviews after that, he has reiterated that missing out on the hundred does not rankle him and he would take the 97, all day.

Perhaps, a few days or years down the line Rahul would feel the same way about his 97. What he will hope to do, at present, is continue to be India's Mr. dependable in the middle in ODIs.