Rahul reaps the reward for consistency

© PTI

For his ability to score heavily on the big stage, KL Rahul has been rewarded with a maiden India call-up.

The Duleep Trophy final played at the Feroz Shah Kotla couple of weeks earlier was a proving ground for several players to get themselves noticed for the India selection. While all eyes were on Robin Uthappa, who had scored a brilliant 120 during the Duleep Trophy semi-final at Lahli, and Naman Ojha, who had hit two double hundreds and two centuries in his last four first-class games, it was KL Rahul who stole the limelight.

Playing in his first Duleep Trophy game on the back of a stellar Ranji season where he finished as the second-highest run-getter with 1033 at an average of 68.86, Rahul became only the eleventh player in the tournament's history to score a century in each innings of the final.

The buzz at the time was about selection and the close fight for the third opener's slot for the Australia tour had many tongues wagging. With Gautam Gambhir's failure in England, it was certain that selectors had their eyes set on the younger lot. Virender Sehwag's name sprung up quite a few times, but the young guns where clear favourites and eventually, Rahul made the cut rather emphatically.

Rahul, 22, has a knack of scoring big when it matters the most and the twin hundreds in the final (185 and 130) against Central Zone exemplified the big match temperament he possesses. And to add further, he had hit a century in last season's Ranji Trophy final and had contributed a match-winning 93 against Pakistan in the Under-23 ACC Emerging Team Cup final in Singapore.

An elegant batsman, Rahul probably played the best two knocks of his career at the Kotla in presence of the national selectors. Going up against the likes of Pankaj Singh and Ishwar Pandey, both of whom were part of India's Test squad in England, it was a fantastic statement to make.

The knock of 185, on a batting friendly day, was sublime at its best. He was free flowing and seldom was he troubled by the pacers. He took on the spinners with ease and more importantly did not lose focus after reaching the triple-figure mark, setting his eyes on the double. The 130-run knock in the second innings, on a wicket that became a bit tough to bat on, Rahul displayed his gritty temperament and toughed it out in the middle before dominating the bowling once again. The common strand in both the innings was his aggression that did not allow the bowlers to get on top of him and his ability to absorb the pressure.

In Australia, Rahul will be an understudy to both Shikhar Dhawan and Murali Vijay and the conditions there will pose a very different challenge to him. By his own admission, he has the skill set and it will be about adapting and handling the pressure of playing cricket at the highest level that will determine his success. He has already toured Australia earlier this year with India A, scoring 101 runs from two first-class games.

The other notable inclusion in the squad is legspinner Karn Sharma who has already played a Twenty20 International for India in England. An average performer in the longer format of the game, the 27-year-old has taken 66 wickets at an average of 28.87 in 37 first-class matches and even though it will be very unlikely that he will get a game Down Under, his selection hints at the fact that the selectors are willing to experiment. A wrist-spinner is always a better wicket-taking option than a finger spinner and who knows, a good practice game against Cricket Australia's Invitational XI might even prompt the management to try him out.

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