KL Rahul Is Temporary Wicketkeeper In Limited-Overs Cricket: Nayan Mongia

It seems like the skipper Virat Kohli and the Indian team management is pretty much convinced with the way things are going at the moment after KL Rahul donned gloves in the limited-overs cricket. The flamboyant cricketer gave a chance for the team to add an extra player in the playing XI. Speaking of the same, the former keeper Nayan Mongia feels Rahul is a temporary gloveman for India in ODIs and T20Is.

Former Indian wicketkeeper-batsman Mongia is of the thought that Rahul cannot be India’s first-choice wicketkeeper even though he feels that Rahul’s technique is better than that of Rahul Dravid, who kept for India in 2003 World Cup an many other games.

The series against Australia gave a lot of positives for the Indian National Cricket Team. One of the major positives was Rahul’s wicket-keeping work, which gave the Indian team management a chance to add an extra batsman in the lineup.

KL Rahul’s batting will be affected – Nayan Mongia

Rahul himself has shown a lot of flexibility in the recent past, first with the bat and then putting his hand up for keeping. Mongia is also of the view that Rahul can’t be the number one choice behind the stumps, at least in ODIs. He also felt that India should go with a specialist keeper instead of a part-time keeper.

“He can be a good second wicket-keeper. He cannot be a permanent wicket-keeper in ODIs. T20s it is still okay but not in ODIs. There should be a regular keeper but he can be a second option,” Mongia said.

You need to have a specialist keeper anyway, Rishabh is there for that. It was just a chance to try Rahul out and he did reasonably well,” he added.

“His (Rahul’s) batting will be affected if he is a regular keeper. He is more important to the team as a batsman than a wicket-keeper batsman,” Mongia maintained.

Before the series, it seemed there was a toss-up between Rahul and Shikhar Dhawan to partner Rohit Sharma at the top. Now, it is all about the selection between Rahul and Pant.