Last Updated on 5 years by Charbel Coorey
Shikhar Dhawan has affirmed that he has not given up on his Test career. After playing for India in 34 matches in the longest format of the game, the Delhi Captains player last turned up for the country in whites in September 2018 on the tour to England. In an interaction with a TV channel, Dhawan said, “I am not a part of the Test team but that does not mean I have given up all hopes of a comeback”.
Dhawan holds the record for the fastest Test century by a debutant in Test cricket, but he faced problems in maintaining that level of consistency thereafter. He was subsequently replaced by the likes of Prithvi Shaw, Mayank Agarwal, KL Rahul, and Rohit Sharma in the squad.
Currently, the playing XI of the Virat Kohli-led side looks settled with the duo of Sharma and Agarwal fixating their spots in the lineup. “The T20 World Cup is there next year, so I need to keep performing, keep myself fit, make runs consistently. If I keep doing these, other things will automatically fall into place”, the former Sunrisers Hyderabad player stated to the PTI.
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The opener will be next seen in IPL 2020 where he represents Delhi Capitals. Shreyas Iyer is the captain of the side and the team managed to attain a third-place finish in the previous season of the league under his leadership. “Shreyas led the team pretty well last year, this time Ajinkya (Rahane) has come in, (Ravichandran) Ashwin has come in, they are quite experienced players and I am sure they are going to share their insights”, he said.
When asked about how he feels about the pandemic affecting the health of the players, Dhawan said, “I have full faith in my body and was never apprehensive about playing. I know I can still get the disease but I can fight it. But we are definitely following the safety guidelines. We have done the COVID test almost eight-nine times. We have to keep wearing a specific badge, our movements are restricted. It’s a huge thing that the BCCI is able to organize the tournament in this situation.”
Written by Anjali Jha. Follow Anjali on Twitter today.
