India and Vidarbha batsman Karun Nair is currently going through a dream batting form. Nair is breaking all sorts of records in domestic cricket and is knocking hard on the door of selection for the Indian team in the 2025 Champions Trophy.
Nair finally opened up after his brilliant performances in the ongoing Vijay Hazare Trophy, India’s domestic 50-over tournament. He still dreams of playing for India one day and that motivates him to play well.
The 33-year-old just wants to focus on one innings at a time and continue to perform at every opportunity he gets. He believes that hard work is the only way to succeed and so far he has done nothing different.
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“The dream is always to play for the country” – Karun Nair
Karun Nair spoke about his dream to play international cricket for India and wants to focus on every innings. He wants to do everything in his control and doesn’t want to think too far ahead.
“The dream is always to play for the country. So yes, the dream is still alive. That’s why we are playing this match, to play for our country. So the one and only goal was to play for the country,” Karuna was quoted as saying by PTI.
“I think this is my third comeback (laughs). And I have to keep doing what I’m doing at the moment. I keep scoring runs whenever I can in every game I play. That’s the most I can do. Everything else is out of my control,” he added.
“But until that (selection) happens, it’s just a dream. It’s not there yet. But again, like I said, I’d like to focus on one innings at a time,” revealed the Vidarbha batsman.
“I didn’t do anything different” – Karun Nair
Karun Nair was further asked about the things he changed to improve his performance. He replied that only hard work had put him in this situation and that he had not done anything differently. He always believed in him and wanted to be in a positive mood.
“I haven’t done anything different. There’s no secret. I think it’s just years of hard work and persistence, you know, putting it all together. And you can probably say, taking every day as a new one and making sure I respect every innings I play,” Karun said.
When he was in bad shape, he started from scratch and worked hard again. He further spoke about a positive thought process even when he was not in good form with the bat.
“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared. I think anyone would have those feelings. But I never had the thought that my career was going to end. I was just thinking where is this going? What am I doing? How did this happen?” remarked Karun.
“It takes you a while to get out of that phase and figure out what’s going on and then what you should do. So I told myself I had to start from scratch again. I gave myself a few years and I’ll see where it goes. And then I can decide what to do, that was my thought process,” he explained.
Karun Nair in Vijay Hazare Trophy
Karun Nair scored 752 runs in eight matches at an incredible average of 752 and a strike rate of 125.96. The right-hander has scored 5 hundreds and 1 fifty in the seven innings he has batted so far in the tournament.
Nair is the top scorer of the tournament so far. He also holds the record for the most runs scored without a dismissal in List A cricket. His strong performances keep him in good shape to be considered for India’s 2025 Champions Trophy squad.
Karun Nair played 6 Tests and 2 ODIs for India. He scored 374 runs at an average of 62.33 in Tests with one triple-century to his name. He scored 46 runs at an average of 23 in two ODIs.
