Centrestage to wilderness and back again — the Kishan saga

Key Highlights

• Having acquitted himself with credit on his Test debut in the Caribbean in July 2023, he would realistically have expected to don the big gloves during the two Tests in South Africa, what with Rishabh Pant still recovering from his horrific car accident of the previous December and K. S.
• Bharat not grabbing his chances against Australia at the beginning of 2023.
• Jitesh Sharma was the preferred stumper for the T20I series in early December in the land of the Protea while K. L.
• Rahul slotted in as the ODI keeper, a role he had performed with aplomb for most of the World Cup in October-November.
• Kishan’s chance lay with the Test side, but given that a plethora of top-order batters – Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill and Shreyas Iyer – were on their first Test tour of South Africa, the think-tank decided to employ Rahul at No.