How Shreyas Iyer reacted to T20 WC Snub, setbacks shows his mindset

Ahead of his team’s Indian Premier League (IPL) match against Mumbai Indians (MI), Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) assistant coach Abhishek Nayar praised captain Shreyas Iyer for his mental strength and positive approach to life, despite some ups and downs during the last few. months, which include an all-time great ICC Cricket World Cup campaign at home, back injuries, losing his central contract with team India and doubts about his commitment to red-ball cricket. MI and KKR will lock horns in a high-octane clash at the Wankhede Stadium on Friday. KKR are in second place in the points table, with six wins and three defeats, giving them 12 points. They won their previous clash against Delhi Capitals. MI is in ninth place with three wins and seven defeats, adding just six points. They lost the previous game to Lucknow Super Giants (LSG).

The last few months have been mixed for Iyer. After missing IPL 2023 due to back surgery with the World Cup in mind, the right-handed batsman returned during the Asia Cup after which he continued to battle fitness issues. He returned in the following series against Australia, scoring a century in one of the ODIs and solidifying a mid-table position for himself in the World Cup, where he broke several records.

After a difficult start to the tournament, Iyer reached his best form towards the end of the tournament, with half-centuries against Sri Lanka and South Africa and two consecutive centuries against Netherlands and New Zealand, with the latter reaching the semi-finals against arch-nemeses which denied Team India the chance to clinch ICC title glory long ago. His hundred, which came in 67 balls, was the fastest ever in a WC knockout match. However, he was dismissed for just four runs in the final, which India lost to Australia.

Iyer finished the tournament with 530 runs at an average of 66.25 with two centuries and three fifties, scoring the most runs by a middle-order batsman in the history of the tournament and becoming the first middle-order batsman in the WC to reach the 500-race mark.

However, after this, Iyer had a disappointing Test in South Africa. He prepared for the next Test challenge against England at home from January to March by playing in a Ranji Trophy match, but was ruled out of the remaining three Tests after poor scores on the first two tests. He then missed the Ranji quarters due to a back spasm despite the Board of Control for Cricket in India’s (BCCI) directive not to ignore it. But he returned for the semi-final and scored 95 runs in the final, but missed a lot of game time in the title match due to back pain. However, despite playing a crucial role in Mumbai’s 42nd triumph, Iyer’s return to domestic cricket seemed too little too late as his name was removed from the BCCI’s central contract list in February.

After that, Iyer joined KKR and has played in every game so far, scoring 251 runs in nine games at an average of 41.83 and a strike rate of 137.15, with a half-century. Although he is not the most fluent, he still managed to score runs after the momentum was established by batsmen Phil Salt and Sunil Narine. Despite his efforts, he missed out on being selected for this year’s ICC T20 World Cup in West Indies/USA starting June 1.

Nayar, who has known Iyer since his early days as a domestic cricketer in Mumbai, said Iyer is one of the strongest people he has met and has dealt with all his setbacks with a positive attitude. Despite all the setbacks, Iyer is great on the field, spending long hours in the nets, he added.

“He’s one of the strongest people, mentally, that I’ve ever met, just in terms of how he accepted certain things that happened to him. I would have seen a lot of people criticizing and talking about it, but I haven’t heard him complain or complain about it. The way he has approached life is in a positive way – whatever is in front of you, you try and accept it,” ESPNCricinfo quoted Nayar as saying.

“Certain things are not in his control, but his fitness is in his control and he is feeling much better now. He looks great on the field, is batting longer hours and has trained very hard. Our S&Cs (strength and fitness) and physiotherapists worked hard on him.”

“Mentally, having a mentality like that after being rejected or not getting his due, he takes it very positively. Even when he talks about it, he’s not negative, he understands that he needs to go back and do well,” he concluded.

Nayar said Iyer’s mentality is to score runs no matter which team he plays for.

“He looks to score runs, it (his setbacks) affected him, but the way he handled it, congratulations to him, because I can imagine a lot of people reacting very differently to him,” concluded the coach.

On the bond between mentor Gautam Gambhir and bowling all-rounder Sunil Narine, Nayar said the bond between the two is “personal”, which is reflected in their hard-hitting batting at the top.

“It’s a very personal bond. It is best understood by these two people. There could be many other things like Gauti telling him to go out there and play with freedom,” Nayar said.

“Gautam Gambhir is the golden boy of Kolkata, he came and won us two championships as captain, and Sunil Narine was part of that journey. There will always be a certain memory that Sunny enjoys. It’s a deeper bond that both of them have made and it carries over reflects in Sunny’s batting. He understands and trusts, the guy trusts in everything I’m going to do, win or lose, succeed or fail”, he concluded.

Narine has been phenomenal this season for KKR, scoring 372 runs in nine innings at an average of 41.33 and a strike rate of 182.35, with one century and two fifties. His best score is 109. He has also taken 11 wickets and is in contention for the Orange Cap and Purple Cap for most runs and wickets this season.

Calcutta Knights Squadron: Philip Salt(w), Sunil Narine, Rinku Singh, Shreyas Iyer(c), Venkatesh Iyer, Andre Russell, Ramandeep Singh, Mitchell Starc, Vaibhav Arora, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Suyash Sharma, Anukul Roy, Manish Pandey , Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Dushmantha Chameera, Allah Ghazanfar, Sakib Hussain, Sherfane Rutherford, Chetan Sakariya, Nitish Rana, Srikar Bharat

Mumbai Indian Squad: Ishan Kishan(w), Rohit Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya(c), Nehal Wadhera, Tim David, Mohammad Nabi, Gerald Coetzee, Piyush Chawla, Jasprit Bumrah, Nuwan Sohara, Naman Dhir, Shams Mulani, Dewald Brevis , Kumar Kartikeya, Luke Wood, Shreyas Gopal, Harvik Desai, Romario Shepherd, Arjun Tendulkar, Shivalik Sharma, Anshul Kamboj, Akash Madhwal, Kwena Maphaka.

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