‘It’s better to be watching from the dressing room than at home on TV’

New Delhi, April 14: A tennis buff, Dinesh Karthik doesn’t miss any chance to show his serve-and-volley game. Disappointed at not being able to make it to India’s Davis Cup tie against Japan, he caught some of the action on television, and then made up for it by having breakfast with Mahesh Bhupathi and Rohan Bopanna on Monday. In Delhi as part of Daredevils squad for the forthcoming IPL, Karthik spoke to the The Indian Express about his frustration at not playing on the Australia tour, being out of the national side, and on his comeback hopes. Excerpts:

Are you happy to get back to your wicket-keeping duties in the IPL?

•I played as a batsman briefly in the Indian team but I’m really happy to be back keeping wickets in the IPL. It’s my passion and I enjoy it. Even in Australia, I used to mix it up in the nets with batting. You could say that I concentrated 60 per cent on my batting and 40 per cent on my keeping. I am still the second wicketkeeper for the Indian team and I will keep in domestic matches whenever I get a chance.

You were India’s first T20 hero with a Man of the Match effort against South Africa. How important is this new opportunity for your career?

•I think T20 has come a long way, and changed completely now. It’s going be a new experience for me. I need to find a way to do well and, once I do that, I’ll take things from there. Hopefully, this IPL will change everything for me.

You have had some time to introspect on what went wrong for you to be out of the Indian side. What were the lessons learnt?

•You need to be strong mentally. You need to be pushing yourself; and you need to raise the bar consistently. That’s what has happened in Indian Cricket at the moment — everybody has raised the bar so you need to raise your own and keep getting better.

Were you disappointed that your Test and one-day performance got overlapped and you lost your place?

•That was bound to happen. There’s so much of cricket happening that you can’t completely disassociate Test and one-day cricket. When you do well in Test cricket, you get picked for the one-day side and likewise when you don’t do well, there is a chance that you will be dropped. It’s a part of Indian cricket and you’ve got to get used to it.

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