What’s the Story?
The problem of plenty is something a team considers as a blessing in disguise, despite it meaning that a deserving player has to take the axe in certain cases. That is exactly what has happened with India’s Karun Nair after he was not picked for the upcoming limited overs series against England which begins on January 15th despite scoring a triple century in his previous Test against the same opposition.
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Currently back in his hometown, Bangalore, Karun spoke at the U-25 Summit, which was held in Bangalore from January 5-8th and gave us an insight about his success story.
“It did not happen overnight. There's a lot which goes into what you are and there are a lot of sacrifices a player has to make. Staying away from family, practising every day and not living a normal life. It’s not easy. Success is defined as what you get on the day, but what happens behind the scenes, only a player knows, ” said Karun.
“I've had support from parents throughout. They haven’t forced me to do something else and they were always behind me. They didn’t force me to study hard as they were fine with me just passing my exams” he continued.
To achieve a triple century in the third match of one’s career is definitely not an easy task. Immense training and hard went behind his success and Karun said that he has worked many years to get where he is today.
“It’s not about that day, but it’s years of hard work to get to that point, and you obviously get better at what you’re doing over the years. Scoring 300 was just about watching the ball and remembering what I have learnt. I didn’t do anything special on that day, it was just adhering to all the training I received over the years,” said Karun.
He garnered a lot of media attention and gained thousands of more fans after his historic knock at Chennai. Despite that, he feels that nothing has changed in his personal life.
“Personally nothing has changed, it’s just the attention and idolation you get from everyone. I don’t think it should affect anyone. After all, you play because you love the game. Off the field, you should do whatever you want,” felt Karun.
In case you didn’t know...
Karun had a poor outing in the first couple of matches for the Indian cricket team, but he followed that up with the knock of his life when he smashed his way to an unbeaten 303 in the fifth and final Test against England at Chennai. By doing so, he became only the second Indian to score a triple century in Tests and only the fifth batsman in history to score a triple century as his maiden Test century.
The heart of the matter
Karun’s parents, who witnessed his son’s historic knock spoke to BCCI.tv shortly after the match and were extremely proud of their son’s knock. Karun, who hailed the knock as one of his best did not feel any pressure and felt completely unperturbed with the presence of his parents in the stands.
What’s next?
While India goes up against England in 3 One Day Internationals and 3 T20 Internationals beginning this Sunday, Karun, who was not included in the squads will work on improving his batting ahead of the Tests against Bangladesh and Australia.
Karun’s rapid fire round
During his talk with Anto Philip, co-founder of the U-25 Summit, Karun went through a “rapid-fire” round of sorts where he was asked a few questions about his personal and professional life. An avid movie goer, Karun mentioned his favourite movie of 2016 to be “War Dogs” and his favourite T.V show to be “Designated Survivor”. Moving on to the Indian cricket dressing room, Karun felt that captain Virat Kohli is the biggest prankster in the team, but also went on mention that he is his biggest inspiration in the current Indian team. When asked about who his role model was growing up, Karun was quick in answering that former Indian batsman Rahul Dravid has always been his inspiration and speaking about what he regards as the best knock in cricket history, he went on to say that Brian Lara’s 400 was the best innings he has witnessed.
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