'Good headache to have': Kohli on selection dilemma ahead of SA tour

It was a stroll in the park for the most part for India at the Wankhede as they beat New Zealand by a massive margin of 372, their biggest victory by runs in Tests. The win also took Virat Kohli's men to the top of the MRF Tyres ICC Men's Test Rankings.

The home side produced a sensational all-round effort, led by Player of the Match Mayank Agarwal, who was well-supported by the other batters in both innings. Ravichandran Ashwin registered a four-for in each innings while the rest of the bowlers chipped in with wickets at regular intervals to peg the Kiwis back.

At the post-match press conference, Virat Kohli said that with the several regular players eventually returning to the Test squad, the selection headache is a good one to have ahead of the South Africa tour.

“Those (decisions on selection) are discussions we are going to have now with the selectors and it's a good headache to have but we also want clarity in these things and understand that it's always great to know exactly what you want to do before you head into a series like South Africa. So, those things are very important for us to address and we are going to have a discussion straight away when we go to the hotel now.”

Two players who will add to the selection dilemma are Agarwal and Axar Patel, who were brilliant in both the Tests against New Zealand. Agarwal finished as the highest run-scorer in the series with 242 runs, which included a fifty and a hundred in the second Test.

Axar Patel, on the other hand, contributed well with both the bat and ball. He was the fifth-highest run-getter in the series with 115 runs while also finishing as the third-highest wicket-taker with nine wickets.

When asked about the performances of Agarwal and Axar Patel, the India Test captain praised the two for their efforts in the two-match series.

“Great application from Mayank. I think to play at this level for a long period of time, you need resilience and you need character and he certainly shown that and we all have gone through these processes where at some stage, we have had to kind of make that impact performance at a very crucial stage and he has done that.

"So, more than just feeling easy about himself as a batter or as an individual, I think, what this will do is, build his character and that will help him in being consistent for India, moving forward in the coming years because he is definitely an asset and he is definitely a guy who has already shown that he has good character.

"Now it's all about him building on that and these kind of innings will really give him the confidence to do so and really come into his own which is always gonna be a great thing for the team."

“Axar is obviously an all-round cricketer. His skill sets are something that provide a good balance to any team he plays for and precisely why he is performing so well in the T20 format for so long and in Test cricket as well, when he’s given an opportunity.

"The good thing to see is, he is adapting his game according to the needs of the format, which I think is a great sign and again, the point I make often is that if he can keep his fitness levels up, if he can keep working on his game, then he has potential to play for a long time. That’s basically the need of the hour in today’s cricket, when we play so much cricket.

"If you can’t keep up your fitness levels, then it becomes more and more difficult but at the moment, he is going through a great phase and I wish him all the success and I hope that he stays fit and stays hungry to play for a long time."

One of the biggest question marks heading into the South Africa series is over the selection of Ajinkya Rahane. Since the turn of the decade, the right-hand batter averages just 24.39 in 16 Tests, with only two fifties and a hundred to his name.

In the series against New Zealand, he only played the first Test where he scored 39 runs across both innings and also captained the side in the absence of Kohli. He missed the second game in Mumbai due to a minor hamstring strain.

On Rahane's form, Kohli said, "I can’t judge Ajinkya’s performance and I think nobody can judge because an individual knows which areas in his game need to be worked on.

"As I said, backing those people, who have delivered impact performances in very difficult situations of important Test matches in the past, is important. So, as a team, we don’t entertain creating an insecure environment because of pressure on them. We cannot expect this balance from the outside as people who appreciate a player today, ask for the player to be dropped after two months. So we never react like this and will never do in future.

"We know how much hard work and effort is required for a person to enter a positive mental space. We will always support that player, be it Ajinkya or any player in future. We will never make decisions based on outside situations.”