Nayar’s ‘House of Pain’ helped Dinesh Karthik get his International career back on track
Former cricketer Abhishek Nayar has revealed that a stint at his ‘House of Pain’ residence in the suburbs of Mumbai before the 2016 IPL helped Dinesh Karthik revive his India career. Nayar also revealed that Karthik is very superstitious at the crease and that’s something they worked on.
More often than not, an individual is required to make certain drastic changes in order to come out of his/her respective comfort zone. This often helps the individual revive his respective career or reach his full potential in times of adversity. Indian cricketer Dinesh Karthik went through a similar patch in the summer of 2016, and that’s when his friend-cum-colleague Abhishek Nayar stepped in to help.
In a recent interview with The Indian Express, Nayar went on to describe a certain ‘House of Pain’ that he along with Karthik lived in ahead of the 2016 season of the IPL. Karthik had scored 355 runs in 12 innings with only one hundred at an average of 32 the previous season. He’d only managed 272 runs in eight games for Tamil Nadu in the limited-overs format, and no one considered him to be a part of the senior team. That’s when Karthik turned to Nayar in a desperate attempt to get back his confidence and step out of his comfort zone.
“It was a torture room for Karthik. He is used to the good life. He stays in a bungalow back home in Chennai. But when he came to me, I wanted to take him to a zone where he’d never been before. It was tough and he would get angry on occasions. One time he begged me to let him go spend a night at a hotel. But I didn’t relent.
“He hadn’t had a good Ranji season back then and he’d seen his stocks drop from Rs 9 crore the previous season to Rs 2 crore in the IPL auction, being picked by Gujarat Lions. It was a moment he (Karthik) felt that if he fails this time then no team will show him interest again,” Nayar recalled.
Karthik went on to put up a decent performance in the IPL that year, as Nayar added that the ‘House of Pain’ wasn’t the only scrutinizing procedure that he put Karthik through during that time of his career.
“In the afternoons, we used to train twice. We used to gym, then do batting, sometimes even meditation. Then we’d work on batting visualization techniques, which he still follows in international cricket, and as it turned out he did well for Gujarat Lions that season,” the Mumbai all-rounder pointed out.
Nayar pointed out that once Karthik got into his rhythm, they began work on other parts of his game. He added that Karthik was a highly superstitious person and they worked on this together in order to help the latter be more confident and expressive on the pitch.
“There was no one to discuss his thoughts with. Those thoughts would mount up and they would get to him. He has less baggage now. He is also very superstitious at the crease. And we’ve worked on cutting down on that. Now he focuses on taking a deep breath before every delivery and getting his mind together,” said Nayar.
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