England vs India: "Pujara and I are not concerned about criticism," says Ajinkya Rahane

Team India’s vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane recently spoke at a pre-match media interaction. He addressed his performance at Lord's and claimed that it was really satisfying. The player's form has blown hot and cold since his gutsy unbeaten century in Melbourne last year. Earlier, Rahane was criticised by fans for his failure to perform with a lot of them calling for the player to be dropped.

The player came back strong during the 2nd innings of the second test with 146-ball 61 in the second innings. "About my innings (at Lord’s), it was really satisfying. For me, I always think about the team so that contribution of 61 was really important.” Ajinkya Rahane said. The player further added that neither he nor Pujara were too worried about the criticism which he called 'noise outside'. 

"I'm happy people are talking about me. I always believe people talk about important people, so I am not too concerned about that. It's all about contributing to the team and Cheteshwar and I have been playing for a long time, we know how to handle pressure, we know how to bat in certain situations. We are just focussing on the team, we just want to contribute to the team and that's what we are doing. Whatever we can't control, we are not thinking about it," Ajinkya Rahane further added.

Team performance is the ultimate goal - Ajinkya Rahane

Ajinkya Rahane further said, that in the end, everything comes down to teamwork and that the end result of the game and the team's success comes above anything else. "I think team performance is the ultimate goal. Individually, you think about your game plans, your methods, your good innings and whatever suits you, you back that method. But ultimately it's all about whatever the team needs, whatever the team's plans are, we just focus on that,"  he concluded. 

Team India next will be up in action on August 25 (3:30 pm IST), for the third Test of the five-match series at Headingley, with India up 1-0 in the England vs India test series having won the Lord's Test by 151 runs. 

Image credits: PTI