"They gave a chance to Karun Nair who wasn't there...”- Abhimanyu Easwaran’s father slams Team India’s selection decisions

Abhimanyu Easwaran has been waiting for his India test debut since 2022.

Abhimanyu Easwaran’s wait for his India test debut continued as he was overlooked for the fifth test against England, which got underway on July 31, 2025, at The Oval in London. India had made four changes, bringing in Karun Nair, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, and Dhruv Jurel.

They replaced Shardul Thakur, Anshul Kamboj, Jasprit Bumrah, and Rishabh Pant respectively. India were also asked to bat first on an overcast and rain-affected day by England, as Shubman Gill lost the toss for the fifth time in five tests.

Father of India’s back-up opener Abhimanyu Easwaran, Ranganathan Easwaran has criticised the selection process used by India after his son was left out of the starting lineup for the current fifth test match against England at the Oval in London.

Karun Nair wasn’t in the team during the period when Abhimanyu performed before the BGT: Abhimanyu Easwaran’s father

Abhimanyu received his first call-up in the red-ball setup for the Bangladesh tour in December 2022, but he hasn’t been able to secure a spot in the starting lineup. Top-order batter Abhimanyu Easwaran wasn’t picked in India’s lineup for the fifth test against England, extending his wait for a test debut to 961 days since first being selected in the Indian test squad.

“I’m not keeping a count of the number of days that Abhimanyu has been waiting for his Test debut. I am counting the years; it has been three years now. What is the job of a player? It is to score runs. He has done that. People said he didn’t perform in two India A matches during the last tour of Australia and didn’t get into the team, which is fair enough.

“But Karun Nair wasn’t in the team during the period when Abhimanyu performed before the BGT. Karun wasn’t picked for the Duleep Trophy or the Irani Trophy. Abhimanyu scored close to 864 runs if you consider the period from last year to the current year,” Ranganathan Easwaran told the Times of India.

Additionally, he said that performances in the Indian Premier League (IPL) shouldn’t be taken into consideration when choosing the test team because certain players are able to get notoriety through them.

“Then how do they compare? I don’t understand. They gave a chance to Karun Nair. Fair enough, he scored 800-plus runs. The selectors have put faith in him. My son looks a little depressed, but that is bound to happen. Some players jump the gun based on IPL performances, which earn them a spot in the Test team. IPL performances should not be counted while selecting the team for the longest format. Ranji Trophy, Duleep Trophy, and Irani Trophy should be the basis for Test selection,” he added.

Easwaran scored a ton of runs for his side in the Duleep, Irani, and Ranji Trophies during the previous domestic season. Throughout the season, his scores were 127*, 191, 116, 19, 157*, 13, 4, 200*, 72, and 65. The Bengal batsman has amassed 7841 runs from 103 games at an average of 48.70 in his First-Class career, with 27 hundreds and 31 fifties.

In the two tour matches prior to the current series, he also had strong knocks of 68 and 80, but he was still not picked over Sai Sudharsan, who was unable to attend the tour games because of his IPL obligations.

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