‘Am I That Bad?’: Kuldeep Yadav On Constantly Kept Out Of Playing XI

Kanpur: India’s chinaman bowler Kuldeep Yadav has been missing out of action lately. Even after being present in the India squad, he isn’t getting a place in the starting 11 in the team. Once, an integral part of the team, Kuldeep Yadav hasn’t been able to rise to the occasion. The style of Kuldeep’s bowling is Chinaman i.e. left-arm wrist spin, which is a rare quality. Even after that, the bowler has not been getting enough chances.

Kuldeep played in a Test match against England in February after two years. He was dropped just after one match even after picking a couple of wickets. Same thing happened with him in the ODI series when he wasn’t picked. In T20Is Kuldeep hasn’t played in the Indian team for almost 16 months. “When you are playing non-stop, players do feel high on confidence. The more one sits out the more it gets tougher. I felt a huge pressure on myself when I played the Test against England in Chennai this February. Due to Covid, there was nothing happening, so things got really tougher even more last year,” said Kuldeep in an interview to News18. 

“I did, sometimes I felt, ‘what is going on?’. It was a difficult time. Sometimes, the mind says, ‘ab shayad woh Kuldeep nahi rahe.’ There were days when you feel serving drinks and being on the bench is for the best and then but there are days you don’t want to be in that place,” he continued.

Even in the 2021 season of the IPL which got canceled due to Covid-19, Kuldeep was not picked up in the KKR side despite them playing at Chennai. KKR’s preference in the spin bowling department was Narine and Chakravarthy. “When I didn’t find a place in my IPL team Kolkata Knight Riders. I wondered, ‘am I that bad?’ It’s a team-management decision and it would be wrong to go and ask them. I wasn’t played in Chennai during the IPL despite knowing it’s a turner. I was a bit shocked but couldn’t do anything,” Kuldeep added.

Laxman Sivaramakrishnan also criticized Kuldeep in an article for cricket.com. He said, “I found Kuldeep has become inconsistent with this line and length and Chahal is not adding more variations to his bowling and has become predictable.”