Karun Nair recalls the last 9 years of his career, which saw him score a triple-century for India, get dropped, make a switch to Vidarbha and script resurgence. Life has come full circle for Karun Nair. The right-handed batter has been smashing records left, right and centre in the ongoing Vijay Hazare Trophy, his form instrumental in Vidarbha reaching the semi-final of the premier domestic 50-over tournament. Karun Nair has battled quite a few hardships over the last few years – who can forget his post in December 2022 when he said, “Dear cricket, give me one more chance?”
The game has listened to Nair’s plea, and the 33-year-old is making the most of it. Karun Nair has recorded scores of 112*, 44*, 163*, 111*, 112 and 122 in VHT, and the batter now hopes to continue his form in the semi-final against Maharashtra on Thursday.
“I’ve not got five 100s in the same tournament ever. So, in terms of results, you can say yes, I’m batting the best that I’ve ever had. But in terms of process and the way of batting, I think I’ve been batting the same way for a while now. And just happy to be contributing to the team and winning games for the team,” Karun Nair. “I think we’ve had a really good campaign. Now is the business end of the tournament. So we need to stay sharp and ready for every game. It’s one game at a time. We’re looking at the next game, and then we’ll try and do our best in the next game and then see where we go.”
During the 2022-23 season, Karnataka moved on from Karun Nair, as the batter was forced to warm the bench for the most season. Looking back, Nair says his post of “dear cricket” was shared in the “heat of the moment.”. He now values every inning he plays, which could well be the reason behind Nair’s resurgence.“I think it was an emotional moment. It was just probably in the heat of the moment kind of post. I am usually pretty calm and composed most of the time. I keep my emotions together. But you know that moment was pretty, you know what I can say, heartbreaking and disappointing for me at that point. Having played for so many years for Karnataka, not to find a spot in any of the teams. So yeah, it was a very heartbreaking moment.”
“But something that I’ve, you know, tried to put aside and use as inspiration and use as fuel to, you know, help me in any match that I play after that. So it’s probably taught me how to value each innings and respect each day as a new day,” he added.
Speaking about his mindset during the time when he wasn’t getting enough chances to play, Nair said, “I think I never lost any hope. It was just about continuing to do what I did, what I was doing, because I didn’t see myself doing anything wrong for not being there. Obviously, I’m not the right person to answer the question of why I was not there. But again, I knew that, you know, if I just kept doing the process that I was doing.“And then, if given an opportunity in the near future, I had to grab that opportunity. So, I needed to be ready for whatever came my way. Because you know, like I said, those 6-7 months really taught me how to value each day and each innings that I play and respect each day as it comes,” he added.
