Karun Nair returned to India’s Test squad after eight years and on his very first outing, the 33-year-old stepped up and proved his mettle against England Lions in Canterbury. Even after scoring an unbeaten triple-century against England, Karun was dropped from the Indian Test squad and was never considered for selection again. Since then, the cricketer has worked tremendously hard on his skillset and scored loads of runs in the Ranji Trophy.
At a point when the Indian selectors were considering changes by bringing in more young cricketers in the mix, they couldn’t ignore the veteran Karun. Courtesy of scoring those runs in red-ball cricket in the domestic circuit, he finally earned a call for the five-match series against England, starting June 20. Ahead of that, the Jodhpur-born featured in the first unofficial Test against England Lions and played a terrific knock in the middle.
After Yashasvi Jaiswal and Abhimanyu Easwaran departed early, Karun and Sarfaraz Khan took over the business and played some sensational cricket. Sarfaraz had a point to prove as well, since the Mumbai batter wasn’t picked for the England series. He was part of the team in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy but couldn’t break into the first team. The 27-year-old wasn’t picked in the IPL as well but he stayed motivated and worked hard to get into better shape.
The duo, meanwhile, played terrific knocks. Sarfaraz departed after scoring 92 runs but Nair managed to get over the line and score a terrific century in 155 balls. The innings mean tremendously for both players but particularly for Karun, as he waited several years to get to the position he is now. On December 10, 2022, he tweeted, “Dear cricket, give me one more chance” and since then, Karun has been a force to reckon with.
With the knock, Karun has arguably cemented his position in the Indian Test squad. He can feature at number six as chief selector Ajit Agarkar previously mentioned that the cricketer was added to add experience, especially after Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli retired.
