'Never Desperate To Play For India': Big Revelation On Asia Cup-Bound Star

Former India wicket-keeper batter Dinesh Karthik was all praise for Jitesh Sharma and said that the cricketer was never 'desperate' to play for the national side. Jitesh impressed everyone with his performances for Royal Challengers Bengaluru in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025. He was a solid presence behind the stumps and even established himeslf as a solid finisher for the side in tight matches. As a result, he was included in the squad for the upcoming Asia Cup 2025 and Karthik said that Jitesh has slowly unlocked his potential and has emerged as a dependable option for the team.

“He was never someone who was desperate to play for India. And he was very free and he went about playing very confidently for Punjab Kings, and then made it to the Indian team. And then he knew that he was on the fringes. That's when he became desperate. That kind of filtered into his performances,” Karthik told Cricbuzz.

“What he wanted to work on was how do I finish a game? How do I get the team to above par? So he was playing a lot of cameos, never knowing how to get that big innings that was required to win a game or take the team far in the first innings. I kind of know what it takes to do that. With the skills he had, there was so much potential that I just needed to unlock it,” he added.

Karthik, who was the mentor and batting coach for RCB, also revealed his conversations with the player and how Jitesh tried to not put a lot of pressure on himself.

"This was part of his questioning to me: 'I want to do well. Obviously, I want to try and represent India. But I don't want to get too caught up and put so much pressure on myself that I'm not enjoying playing wherever I am playing.' And our journey as a coach and player very much started there as well, you know, having those conversations," Karthik said.

Topics mentioned in this article

Jitesh Sharma Dinesh Karthik India Cricket Team Asia Cup 2025 Cricket