India batter Karun Nair, who is on a comeback trail to the red-ball team after a hiatus of eight years, made a shocking revelation that a prominent Indian cricketer advised him to retire and shift focus entirely to T20 leagues to ensure financial stability.
The 33-year-old made his Test debut against England in Mohali in 2016 and went on to hit an unbeaten 303 in his third Test in Chennai, grabbing eyeballs. However, after that historic knock, he only played three home Tests against Australia in 2017 before being dropped from the team due to a series of low scores.
"I still remember a prominent Indian cricketer calling me and saying you need to retire because the money in these leagues would make me secure. It would have been easy to do but I knew that regardless of the money, I would be kicking myself for giving up that easily," Nair said in an interview with Daily Mail.
"I was never going to give up on playing for India again. That was just over two years ago and look where we are now,’ he insists. It's crazy, but deep down, I knew I was good enough," he added.
Despite the setbacks, Karun Nair never gave up on his dream of returning to the Indian team. Following the 2022 season, he endured a challenging period of nearly 14 months without playing any competitive cricket. However, he marked the beginning of his revival through a County stint with Northamptonshire.
"It was next to nothing, but I didn’t care because that was the opportunity I was desperate for. I went straight to Birmingham, had one net session and the day after, scored 78 at Edgbaston," he said.
A week after joining Northamptonshire, he got 150 against Surrey at The Oval - the same ground where he thought he was going to get his chance in 2018. "I remember standing on the balcony and soaking it in and thinking about everything that had happened five years before and how it had to come back full circle.
With the happiness involved, it’s my most satisfying innings because I knew it was all about coming here and scoring runs. When you score runs in county cricket, people in India take note and listen. People like Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly all messaged me to say congratulations," Nair recalled.
The right-handed batter switched his base from Karnataka to Vidarbha in 2023. He went on to score 690 runs in 10 games and followed it with 863 runs in nine Ranji Trophy games in 2024 with four centuries, including one in the finals, which paved the way for Vidarbha to lift the trophy.
He also showed signs of power-hitting in the Vijay Hazare Trophy, amassing 779 runs in just eight innings, including five centuries, which prompted the Delhi Capitals to pick him in the IPL mega auction for Rs 50 lakh for the 2025 season.
Nair admitted that towards the end of last year, he was manifesting the feeling of representing the national team again. "I manifested playing for India. There was a domestic game last year where they played the national anthem, and we were standing in a line, and I got that feeling of ‘Oh, I need this to happen again’ and picturing myself in Indian whites," said Nair.