“Point Of Difference”: Rahul Dravid On Why Dinesh Karthik Will Be In Focus In South Africa T20Is

Dinesh Karthik has made a comeback to the Indian cricket team on the back of some stupendous show in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2022. Playing for Royal Challengers Bangalore, the 37-year-old wicketkeeper-batter aced the finisher’s role scoring 330 runs in 16 matches at a strike-rate of 183.33. Courtesy that performance, the veteran has made a comeback into the squad. That last time he played for India was at the 2019 ICC World Cup. As Team India looks to get its house in order ahead of the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia in October, the T20I series against South Africa will be a massive opportunity for Karthik.

Indian cricket team head coach Rahul Dravid admitted that they will be looking at Karthik’s performance with the bat closely.

“With Dinesh it is pretty obvious and very clear. He has made a comeback based on the skills that he has shown in a particular phase of the game. The phase of the game that Dinesh, at the back-end, has really been able to show skills over the last two or three years, he has been able to be a point of difference for whichever team that he has played,” Dravid said.

“I see that as no different (in Team India). That’s why he has been picked. He has been picked to bat in that kind of position, and see whether he can replicate those kind of performance for India as well.”

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With several seniors like Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma missing from the series, Dravid went on to add that it is unrealistic to think that senior players will be available every time for every game.

“We want to ensure that they are fit for big tournaments and we have to manage them before that to ensure that they are peaking at big games and tournaments. We understand that there are times when we will have to rest our big players and will be able to probably field our best side all the time. But from my perspective, this is also exciting for other youngsters to get opportunities to play. It helps us improve the depth of our side. There are some positives that come out of such situations,” he added.