Ajinkya Rahane is scratchy feels Sourav Ganguly

The very first ball Ajinkya Rahane faced today from Pat Cummins was a bouncer, outside his off-stump and he tried to upper cut it, didn’t connect and luckily so as the ball landed straight into Matthew Wade’s gloves. He collected 10 runs soon after via a six and a four but both were edges. The Indian skipper got the runs but certainly didn’t look comfortable at the crease.

He survived and looked just about fine during his 104-ball stay at the crease, though he played some good shots towards the end but was tied down by off-spinner Nathan Lyon who didn’t allow him to play the sweep shot his most effective shot against the tweaker by coming over the wicket.

Rahane was eventually dismissed by Lyon for 46 but former Indian captain Sourav Ganguly who has been a clear admirer wasn’t pleased with the way he has been batting. In complete contradiction to an excellent away record, Rahane hasn’t managed to get going at home. He did score 360 odd runs against New Zealand but had a quite series against England and has been off color in the last 7 innings as well.

“Ajinkya Rahane is scratchy. It is not the Rahane we have seen over a long period of time. Think about the Rahane at Lord’s (2013) where it was seaming, decking, bouncing and he just batted as if it was a different track.” Ganguly was quoted as saying by India Today.

The southpaw feels Rahane might be missing the mental edge he enjoys while at his best. “Imagine his hundreds in Australia. He is just a bit out of the place at the moment, maybe mentally… the confidence has gone down a bit because he hasn’t had a good series against England,”

This is the last game of the 13 Test long home season, though he has been trusted as Virat Kohli’s lieutenant by the team management Rahane clearly needs to take some time out to get his act together to be back to his self again.

“He hasn’t had a good series so far by his standards. So, his confidence level is down a bit and you can see that in his batting. I think it is not the Rahane but he is surviving, he is trying hard, he is competing…typical Mumbai khadoosness as they say. But we have seen a better Rahane. And I think once this series finishes, he will probably will have to sit down and find a way to relax and get his mind back on track,” Dada said.