Ajinkya Rahane might have lost his place in the Indian national cricket team, but the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) assistant coach David Hussey is of the opinion that Rahane is nowhere near finished as an international cricketer yet and can still play a decade of international cricket.
Rahane is in his 30s now and while he has not been in the plans of the Indian selectors for a long time in white-ball cricket, he recently lost his place in red-ball cricket too because of his inconsistent performances with the bat.
Since Rahane was released by his IPL team Delhi Capitals ahead of IPL mega auction 2022, there were question marks if he would get a new IPL contract because he had not been amongst the runs for a while.
But, KKR backed the veteran Indian top-order batsman in the auction and bought him at his base price. Now after Hussey’s statements, it seems Rahane might get a spot in KKR’s playing XI straightaway.
KKR has bought Ajinkya Rahane for stability in the top order
The KKR owners, on the day of the mega auction, had hinted that the reason the franchise went for Ajinkya Rahane was because they wanted a stable batsman at the top of the order to complement some of the free flowing batsmen that KKR has.
KKR might be looking at Rahane to play the kind of role that Shubman Gill used to play for them. Gill used to hold one end up for KKR, while the other batsmen just used to go hammer and tongs at the other end.
Ajinkya Rahane has had a fairly decent IPL career over the years. At one point of time, Rahane was the vital cog in Rajasthan Royals’ line up and was also the captain of the team, but because of the loss of form, both at the international and the franchise level, his stocks dropped down
