India cricket team’s batting woes have been exposed in the recent tours, with the top-order specifically failing to live up to the expectations. The likes of Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Rishabh Pant among others have failed to fire with the bat, with their miserable performances putting the Border-Gavaskar Trophy and the World Test Championship (WTC) final on the line. If there is one way that the batters can redeem themselves and find their golden touch, it is via domestic cricket – specifically the Ranji Trophy.
The second round of Ranji Trophy is all set to commence from January 23. While the ICC Champions Trophy is just around the corner, veterans like Rohit and Kohli should not repeat the same mistake as they did in 2024. Instead, the Indian batting line-up must participate in first-class cricket to rediscover their golden touch. More so, it is imperative for them to play domestic games in order to extend their run in India’s Test XI. At present, none of the batters have delivered with the bat and have looked very much out of touch.
Why Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli & others need to play Ranji Trophy
Let us begin with stalwarts Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli. The duo decided to skip domestic red-ball tournaments including the Ranji Trophy and Duleep Trophy in the latter half of 2024. While it could have come of good use to the duo, they chose to skip the tournament despite being given the option to do so. The result? Rohit managed to score 164 runs in the last 15 innings, Kohli has only scored 359 runs in the last 17 innings. To make matters worse, the latter’s average has dipped below 50 over the last four years in red-ball cricket and is lower than that of Jaspit Bumrah’s in the first innings since 2024.
While Rohit decided to draw the line and drop himself from the XI for IND vs AUS 5th Test, Kohli witnessed yet another failure as he was dismissed for the 8th time in the ongoing BGT series while attempting to play a delivery outside the off-stump. The best way for the duo to rediscover their form is to participate in domestic red-ball cricket tournaments and that begins with the Ranji Trophy season.
| Player | Matches | Innings | Runs |
| Rohit Sharma | 8 | 15 | 164 |
| Virat Kohli | 10 | 19 | 382 |
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Gill, Pant & Rahul also need to play domestic games
While the rest of India’s batting order including Sarfaraz Khan, Dhruv Jurel, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Nitish Reddy have been regulars in playing domestic cricket, the others must follow suit too. This includes Jaiswal, Pant, Gill, Jadeja and KL Rahul. While the Karnataka batter has arguably been India’s best batter in the ongoing IND vs AUS series, the others have failed to fire and live up to the expectations and achieve the benchmarks they have set for themselves. It is imperative for the rest of the batting order to resume playing domestic cricket and priortize performance over ego in order to improve their stats.
| Player | Matches | Innings | Runs |
| Yashasvi Jaiswal | 10 | 19 | 716 |
| KL Rahul | 7 | 13 | 408 |
| Rishabh Pant | 9 | 17 | 677 |
| Shubman Gill | 7 | 13 | 401 |
| Ravindra Jadeja | 8 | 13 | 329* |
It is pertinent to point out that while most of the Indian batters have tasted success at home, they have failed to replicate their performances in overseas tours. While the likes of KL Rahul and Gill took part in domestic tournaments recently, it has been a long time since the others were a part of the first-class tournaments. This preferential treatment of ignoring domestic red-ball tournaments must end and the batters should rather follow the footsteps of the players from other countries and better their performances with some first-class experience rather than banking on a break after every big series.
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