Ashwin lauds KL Rahul for 'doing very difficult role with ease', compares him with MS Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh

A lot has been said and written about KL Rahul of late. While he hasn't featured for India in the shortest format after the T20 World Cup and his form in red-ball format led to a huge war of words between Venkatesh Prasad and Aakash Chopra, the right-hander is on a roll as an ODI batter. In the ongoing India-Australia ODIs, the wicketkeeper-batter struck a magnificent 75 not out in the series opener, helping the Men in Blue win by five wickets.

Ever since Rahul has been given the task to bat at No. 5 in ODIs, the 30-year-old has come to his own. He has played18 innings at No. 5, slamming742 runs with one hundred and seven fifties at an average of 53.00. Thus, India's veteran off-spinner R Ashwin shunned Rahul's critics and lauded him for performing a tough role with ease. In addition, he compared him with MS Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh, two of India's finest middle-order batters in white-ball formats.

'Yuvraj,Dhonibatted mostly at 5 in ODIs and made a mark. Rahul is doing a tough job with ease'

"Consider everyone who is currently batting at No.5 in ODI cricket. There isn't even one cricketer at the moment who bats at No 5 and has made a mark for himself. Because it is a very tough position to bat. Yuvraj Singh and MS Dhoni were the only two guys who batted mostly at 5 in ODIs and made a mark for themselves. Dhoni mostly batted at 6 though. For Australia, it was Michael Bevan. It is not at all easy to bat in that number in ODIs," said Ashwin on his Youtube channel.

The 36-year-old Test specialist further asserted, "If people we like do something good and get trending on Twitter then we will start worshipping and celebrating them like anything but if they are going through a bad patch, we will not celebrate their value or the magnitude of what they are doing. KL Rahul is doing a very difficult role with ease. He has been a proper box-office in ODIs. He has got phenomenal numbers batting at No.5. GO and search if you can find anyone even close to him in terms of numbers in ODIs."

"Immediately after his knock (in Mumbai) people were like 'KL Rahul is back'. KL Rahul didn't go anywhere in ODI cricket to be back. He didn't do anything for us to put him down one day and celebrate him the other day. We shouldn't do that. We should know how to assess a player's performance. If we don't do that, we will back all the wrong and play all the wrong people," Ashwin concluded.

Rahul-starrer India is involved in the third and final ODI versus Australia, in Chennai, on Wednesday (March 22). The series is on the line, at 1-1, and Rahul will once again hope to perform with the bat and take Rohit Sharma & Co. to a series triumph versus the No. 2 ranked Australian side. He will then lead the Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) in IPL 2023.