'Rahul's numbers are not looking as bad as he is suggesting' - Aakash Chopra hits back at Venkatesh Prasad over criticism of KL Rahul

Aakash Chopra (Image credits: Twitter)

Former Indian seamer Venkatesh Prasad has repeatedly questioned the inclusion of KL Rahul in India's longer format during the Border-Gavaskar Trophy through his Twitter account. Prasad tried to prove his statement that Rahul is not a good option for India in Tests with the help of some statistics. India's opening batter in Tests and T20Is has not had a good time on the field for a long time and has suffered back-to-back defeats in the ongoing series against Australia.

Prasad found that Rahul's overseas average was only 30 in 56 innings. He said the right-handed batter scored 6 overseas centuries but followed it up with a string of low scores. However, his stats were criticized by former Indian cricketer Aakash Chopra, who highlighted that Prasad did not use the right numbers to justify his point.

"He (Prasad) has said that KL Rahul's overseas record is absolutely ordinary. He asked us to ignore the overseas centuries and said that he hasn't scored runs other than that. I am saying what if you ignore Sachin paaji's (Tendulkar) centuries and check how many ducks he scored? Then it would be slightly wrong. I feel if you are seeing stats, see them fully and try to justify them properly. Let's see the last three years, because three years is a big sample size, let's not talk about what happened as a kid. If we see his record in SENA countries since 20th Feb 2021, his average is only after Rohit Sharma," Chopra said in a video shared on his YouTube channel.

There is a view that KL Rahul has an outstanding overseas Test record. But stats speak otherwise. He has a test avg of 30 overseas in 56 innings. He has scored 6 overseas centuries but followed it up with a string of low scores that’s why averaging 30. Let’s look at a few others pic.twitter.com/MAvHM01TcY

— Venkatesh Prasad (@venkateshprasad) February 20, 2023

Rahul outperformed most Indian batters in SENA countries, says Chopra

The former India opener also highlighted the fact that Rahul had scored a century and a half-century in India's last two away series in England and South Africa, while most of the other batters did not have a great time. The commentator also reminded that Rahul has outplayed most of the Indian batters in SENA countries in the last three years.

"If we make it three years instead of two, Rohit Sharma's average (43) is again best. There also KL Rahul is at No. 2 - he has an average of 39, and then Rishabh Pant (38) and Shubman Gill (35). Virat Kohli has an average of 27 on this list. KL Rahul's numbers are not looking as bad as he is suggesting."

Chopra had full confidence in what he was talking about as the former India opener pointed out that Rahul had only played the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy on home soil for the last three years. "If someone has played only three innings at home in the last three years, is it right to start a Twitter tirade if a guy gets out in one innings?" asks Chopra. Meanwhile, he acknowledged that the former India vice-captain performed poorly in the away Tests against Bangladesh last year. But pointed out that Prasad did not refer to those numbers at all while criticizing the India batter.